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THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

AND 

THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 



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THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON ■ CHICAGO 
DALLAS • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 



THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 



AND 



THE WIDOW m THE BYE STREET 



BY 

JOHN MASEFIELD 

AUTHOR OF "the TRAGEDY OF NAN," "THE 
TRAGEDY OF POMPEY THE GREAT," ETC. 



Keto gorft 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1912 

All rights reserved 



.A77 £7 
11/s. 



COPTKIGHT, 1911, 

By JOHN MASEFIELD. 

Copyright, 1912, 
By the MACMILLAN COMPANY. 

Set up and dectrotyped. Published March, 1912. 



NortoooU 33re88 
S. Gushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co. 
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 



»Q,C!.A312310 
6' . / 



TO MY WIFE 



Thy place is higgyd above the sterrys deer, 
Noon erthely paleys wrouhte in so statly wyse, 
Com on my freend, my brothir moost enteer, 
For the I offryd my blood in sacrifise. 

John Lydgate. 



THE EVERLASTING MEECY 

From '41 to '51 

I was my folk's contrary son ; 

I bit my father's hand right through 

And broke my mother's heart in two. 

I sometimes go without my dinner 

Now that I know the times I've gi'n her. 

From '51 to '61 

I cut my teeth and took to fun. 

I learned what not to be afraid of 

And what stuff women's lips are made of ; 

I learned with what a rosy feeling 

Good ale nxakes floors seem like the ceiling, 

And how the moon gives shiny light 

To lads as roll home singing by't. 

B 1 



2 THE EVERLASTING MEECT 

My blood did leap, my flesh did revel, 
Saul Kane was tokened to the devil. 

From '61 to '67 

I lived in disbelief of Heaven. 

I drunk, I fought, I poached, I whored, 

I did despite unto the Lord. 

I cursed, 'would make a man look pale, 

And nineteen times I went to gaol. 

Now, friends, observe and look upon me, 
Mark how the Lord took pity on me. 
By Dead Man's Thorn, while setting wires. 
Who should come up but Billy Myers, 
A friend of mine, who used to be . 
As black a sprig of hell as me, 
With whom I'd planned, to save encroachin', 
Which fields and coverts each should poach 

in. 
Now when he saw me set my snare, 



THE EVEBLASTING MEBCY 3 

He tells me "Get to hell from there. 
This field is mine," he says, "by right; 
If you poach here, there'll be a fight. 
Out now," he says, ''and leave your wire; 
It's mine." 

''It ain't." 

"You put." 

"You liar." 
"You closhy put." 
"You bloody liar." 
"This is my field." 
"This is my wire." 
"I'm ruler here." 
"You ain't." 
"lam." 

"I'll fight you for it." 
"Right, by damn. 

Not now, though, I've a-sprained my thumb, 
We'll fight after the harvest hum. 
And Silas Jones, that bookie wide. 



4 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Will make a purse five pounds a side." 
Those were the words, that was the place 
By which God brought me into grace. 

On Wood Top Field the peewits go 
Mewing and wheeling ever so ; 
And like the shaking of a timbrel 
Cackles the laughter of the whimbrel. 
In the old quarry-pit they say 
Head-keeper Pike was made away. 
He walks, head-keeper Pike, for harm, 
He taps the windows of the farm ; 
The blood diips from his broken chin. 
He taps and begs to be let in. 
On Wood Top, nights, I've shaked to hark 
The peewits wambling in the dark 
Lest in the dark the old man might 
Creep up to me to beg a Ught. 

But Wood Top grass is short and sweet 
And springy to a boxer's feet ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 5 

At harvest hum the moon so bright 
Did shine on Wood Top for the fight. 

When Bill was stripped down to his 

bends 
I thought how long we two'd been friends, 
And in my mind, about that wire, 
I thought " He's right, I am a har. 
As sure as skilly's made in prison 
The right to poach that copse is his'n. 
I'll have no luck to-night," thinks I. 
''I'm fighting to defend a lie. 
And this moonshiny evening's fun 
Is worse than aught I've ever done." 
And thinking that way my heart bled so 
I almost stept to Bill and said so. 
And now Bill's dead I would be glad 
If I could only think I had. 
But no. I put the thought away 
For fear of what my friends would say. 



6 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

They'd backed me, see ? Lord, the sin 
Done for the things there's money in. 

The stakes were drove, the ropes were 

hitched, 
Into the ring my hat I pitched. 
My corner faced the Squire's park 
Just where the fir trees make it dark ; 
The place where I begun poor Nell 
Upon the woman's road to hell. 
I thought oft, sitting in my corner 
After the time-keep struck his warner 
(Two brandy flasks, for fear of noise. 
Clinked out the time to us two boys). 
And while my seconds chafed and gloved me 
I thought of Nell's eyes when she loved me, 
And wondered how my tot would end, 
First Nell cast off and now my friend ; 
And in the moonlight dim and wan 
I knew quite well my luck was gone ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 7 

And looking round I felt a spite 
At all who'd come to see me fight ; 
The five and forty human faces 
Inflamed by drink and going to races, 
Faces of men who'd never been 
Merry or true or live or clean ; 
Who'd never felt the boxer's trim 
Of brain divinely knit to limb, 
Nor felt the whole live body go 
One tingling health from top to toe ; 
Nor took a punch nor given a swing, 
But just soaked deady round the ring 
Until their brains and bloods were foul 
Enough to make their throttles howl, 
While we whom Jesus died to teach 
Fought round on round, three minutes 
each. 

And thinking that, you'll understand 
I thought, "I'll go and take Bill's hand. 



8 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

I'll up and say the fault was mine, 

He shan't make play for these here swine." 

And then I thought that that was silly, 

They'd think I was afraid of Billy ; 

They'd think (I thought it, God forgive 

me) 
I funked the hiding Bill could give me. 
And that thought made me mad and hot. 
''Think that, will they? Well, they shall 

not. 
They shan't think that. I will not. I'm 
Damned if I will. I will not." 

Time! 

From the beginning of the bout 

My luck was gone, my hand was out. 

Right from the start Bill called the play, 

But I was quick and kept away 

Till the fourth round, when work got mixed, 

And then I knew Bill had me fixed. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 9 

My hand was out, why, Heaven knows ; 
Bill punched me when and where he chose. 
Through two more rounds we quartered wide, 
And all the time my hands seemed tied ; 
Bill punched me when and where he pleased. 
The cheering from my backers eased, 
But every punch I heard a yell 
Of "That's the style. Bill, give him hell." 
No one for me, but Jimmy's light 
"Straight left ! Straight left !" and "Watch 
his right." 

I don't know how a boxer goes 

When all his body hums from blows ; 

I know I seemed to rock and spin, 

I don't know how I saved my chin ; 

I know I thought my only friend 

Was that clinked flask at each round's end 

When my two seconds, Ed and Jimmy, 

Had sixty seconds help to gimme. 



10 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

But in the ninth, with pain and knocks 
I stopped : I couldn't fight nor box. 
Bill missed his swing, the light was tricky, 
But I went down, and stayed down, dicky. 
''Get up," cried Jim. I said, "I will." 
Then all the gang yelled, "Out him. Bill. 
Out him." Bill rushed . . . and Clink, 

Clink, Clink. 
Time ! and Jim's knee, and rum to drink. 
And round the ring there ran a titter : 
"Saved by the call, the bloody quitter." 

They drove (a dodge that never fails) 
A pin beneath my finger nails. 
They poured what seemed a running beck 
Of cold spring water down my neck ; 
Jim with a lancet quick as flies 
Lowered the swellings round my eyes. 
They sluiced my legs and fanned my face 
Through all that blessed minute's grace ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 11 

They gave my calves a thorough kneading, 
They salved my cuts and stopped the bleeding. 
A gulp of liquor dulled the pain, 
And then the two flasks clinked again. 

Time! 

There was Bill as grim as death, 
He rushed, I clinched, to get more breath, 
And breath I got, though Billy bats 
Some stinging short-arms in my slats. 
And when we broke, as I foresaw, 
He swung his right in for the jaw. 
I stopped it on my shoulder bone. 
And at the shock I heard Bill groan — 
A little groan or moan or grunt 
As though I'd hit his wind a bunt. 
At that, I clinched, and while we clinched, 
His old time right arm dig was flinched, 
And when we broke he hit me light 
As though he didn't trust his right. 



12 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

He flapped me somehow with his wrist 

As though he couldn't use his fist, 

And when he hit he winced with pain. 

I thought, "Your sprained thumb's crocked 

again." 
So I got strength and Bill gave ground, 
And that round was an easy round. 

During the wait my Jimmy said, 

"What's making Billy fight so dead? 

He's all to pieces. Is he blown ?" 

"His thumb's out." 

"No ? Then it's your own. 

It's all your own, but don't be rash — 

He's got the goods if you've got cash. 

And what one hand can do he'll do, 

Be careful this next round or two." 

Time. There was Bill, and I felt sick 
That luck should play so mean a trick 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 13 

And give me leave to knock him out 

After he'd plainly won the bout. 

But by the way the man came at me 

He made it plain he meant to bat me ; 

If you'd a seen the way he come 

You wouldn't think he'd crocked a thumb. 

With all his skill and all his might 

He chpped me dizzy left and right ; 

The Lord knows what the effort cost, 

But he was mad to think he'd lost, 

And knowing nothing else could save him 

He didn't care what pain it gave him. 

He called the music and the dance 

For five rounds more and gave no chance. 

Try to imagine if you can 

The kind of manhood in the man. 

And if you'd like to feel his pain 

You sprain your thumb and hit the sprain. 

And hit it hard, with all your power 



14 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

On something hard for half-an-hour, 
While someone thumps you black and blue, 
And then you'll know what Billy knew. 
Bill took that pain without a sound 
Till halfway through the eighteenth round, 
And then I sent him down and out, 
And Silas said, ''Kane wins the bout." 

When Bill came to, you understand, 

I ripped the mitten from my hand 

And went across to ask Bill shake. 

My limbs were all one pain and ache, 

I was so weary and so sore 

I don't think I'd a stood much more. 

Bill in his corner bathed his thumb. 

Buttoned his shirt and glowered glum. 

"I'll never shake your hand," he said. 

''I'd rather see my children dead. 

I've been about and had some fun with you, 

But you're a liar and I've done with you. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 15 

You've knocked me out, you didn't beat me ; 
Look out the next time that you meet me, 
There'll be no friend to watch the clock for 

you 
And no convenient thumb to crock for you, 
And I'll take care, with much dehght, 
You'll get what you'd a got to-night ; 
That puts my meaning clear, I guess, 
Now get to hell ; I want to dress." 

I dressed. My backers one and all 

Said, ''Well done you," or ''Good old Saul." 

"Saul is a wonder and a fly 'un, 

What'll you have, Saul, at the Lion?" 

With merry oaths they helped me down 

The stony wood path to the town. 

The moonlight shone on Cabbage Walk, 
It made the limestone look like chalk. 
It was too late for any people, 



16 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Twelve struck as we went by the steeple. 
A dog barked, and an owl was calling, 
The squire's brook was still a-falling, 
The carved heads on the church looked down 
On ''Russell, Blacksmith of this Town," 
And all the graves of all the ghosts 
Who rise on Christmas Eve in hosts 
To dance and carol in festivity 
For joy of Jesus Christ's Nativity 
(Bell-ringer Dawe and his two sons 
Beheld 'em from the bell-tower once), 
Two and two about about 
Singing the end of Advent out. 
Dwindling down to windlestraws 
When the glittering peacock craws, 
As craw the glittering peacock should 
When Christ's own star comes over the wood. 
Lamb of the sky come out of fold 
Wandering windy heavens cold. 
So they shone and sang till twelve 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 17 

When all the bells ring out of theirselve. 
Rang a peal for Christmas morn, 
Glory, men, for Christ is born. 

All the old monks' singing places 
Glimmered quick with flitting faces, 
Singing anthems, singing hymns 
Under carven cherubims. 
Ringer Dawe aloft could mark 
Faces at the window dark 
Crowding, crowding, row on row, 
Till all the Church began to glow. 
The chapel glowed, the nave, the choir, 
All the faces became fire 
Below the eastern window high 
To see Christ's star come up the sky. 
Then they lifted hands and turned. 
And all their hfted fingers burned. 
Burned like the golden altar tallows. 
Burned like a troop of God's own Hallows, 



18 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Bringing to mind the burning time 
When all the bells will rock and chime 
And burning saints on burning horses 
Will sweep the planets from their courses 
And loose the stars to burn up night. 
Lord, give us eyes to bear the Hght. 

We all went quiet down the Scallenge 

Lest Police Inspector Drew should challenge. 

But 'Spector Drew was sleeping sweet, 

His head upon a charges sheet, 

Under the gas jet flaring full. 

Snorting and snoring like a bull, 

His bull cheeks puffed, his bull lips blowing, 

His ugly yellow front teeth showing. 

Just as we peeped we saw him fumble 

And scratch his head, and shift, and mumble. 

Down in the lane so thin and dark 
The tan-yards stank of bitter bark, 
The curate's pigeons gave a flutter, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 19 

A cat went courting down the gutter, 
And none else stirred a foot or feather. 
The houses put their heads together, 
Talking, perhaps, so dark and sly. 
Of all the folk they'd seen go by. 
Children, and men and women, merry all. 
Who'd some day pass that way to burial. 
It was all dark, but at the turning 
The Lion had a window burning. 
So in we went and up the stairs, 
Treading as still as cats and hares. 
The way the stairs creaked made you wonder 
If dead men's bones were hidden under. 
At head of stairs upon the landing 
A woman with a lamp was standing ; 
She greet each gent at head of stairs 
With ''Step in, gents, and take your chairs. 
The punch'll come when kettle bubble. 
But don't make noise or there'll be trouble." 
'Twas Doxy Jane, a bouncing girl 



20 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

With eyes all sparks and hair all curl, 
And cheeks all red and lips all coal, 
And thirst for men instead of soul. 
She's trod her pathway to the fire. 
Old Rivers had his nephew by her. 

I step aside from Tom and Jimmy 

To find if she'd a kiss to gimme. 

I blew out lamp 'fore she could speak. 

She said, "If you ain't got a cheek," 

And then beside me in the dim, 

"Did he beat you or you beat him?" 

"Why, I beat him" (though that was wrong). 

She said, "You must be turble strong. 

I'd be afraid you'd beat me, too." 

"You'd not," I said, "I wouldn't do." 

"Never?" 

"No, never." 

"Never?" 

"No." 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 21 

"0 Saul. Here's missus. Let me go." 
It wasn't missus, so I didn't, 
' Whether I mid do or I midn't. 
Until she'd promised we should meet 
Next evening, six, at top of street. 
When we could have a quiet talk 
On that low wall up Worcester Walk. 
And while we whispered there together 
I give her silver for a feather 
And felt a drunkenness like wine 
And shut out Christ in husks and swine. 
I felt the dart strike through my liver. 
God punish me for't and forgive her. 

Each one could be a Jesus mild, 
Each one has been a little child, 
A little child with laughing look, 
A lovely white unwritten book ; 
A book that God will take, my friend, 
As each goes out at journey's end. 



22 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

The Lord Who gave us Earth and Heaven 
Takes that as thanks for all He's given. 
The book he lent is given back 
All blotted red and smutted black. 

''Open the door," said Jim, ''and call." 
Jane gasped "They'll see me. Loose me, 

Saul." 
She pushed me by, and ducked downstair 
With half the pins out of her hair. 
I went inside the lit room rollen 
Her scented handkerchief I'd stolen. 
"What would you fancy, Saul?" they said. 
"A gin punch hot and then to bed." 
"Jane, fetch the punch bowl to the gemmen ; 
And mind you don't put too much lemon. 
Our good friend Saul has had a fight of it. 
Now smoke up, boys, and mq:ke a night of it." 

The room was full of men and stink 
Of bad cigars and heavy drink. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 23 

Riley was nodding to the floor 
And gurgling as he wanted more. 
His mouth was wide, his face was pale, 
His swollen face was sweating ale ; 
And one of those assembled Greeks 
Had corked black crosses on his cheeks. 
Thomas was having words with Goss, 
He "wouldn't pay, the fight was cross." 
And Goss told Tom that ''cross or no, 
The bets go as the verdicts go, 
By all I've ever heard or read of. 
So pay, or else I'll knock your head off." 
Jim Gurvil said his smutty say 
About a girl down Bye Street way, 
And how the girl from Froggatt's circus 
Died giving birth in Newent work'us. 
And Dick told how the Dymock wench 
Bore twins, poor thing, on Dog Hill bench ; 
And how he'd owned to one in Court 
And how Judge made him sorry for't. 



24 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Jack set a Jew's harp twanging drily; 

''Gimme another cup," said Riley. 

A dozen more were in their glories 

With laughs and smokes and smutty stories ; 

And Jimmy joked and took his sup 

And sang his song of "Up, come up." 

Jane brought the bowl of stewing gin 

And poured the egg and lemon in. 

And whisked it up and served it out 

While bawdy questions went about. 

Jack chucked her chin, and Jim accost her 

With bits out of the ''Maid of Gloster." 

And fifteen arms went round her waist. 

(And then men ask. Are Barmaids chaste ?) 

young men, pray to be kept whole 
From bringing down a weaker soul. 
Your minute's joy so meet in doin' 
\ May be the woman's door to ruin ; 
The door to wandering up and down, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 25 

A painted whore at half a crown. 

The bright mind fouled, the beauty gay 

All eaten out and fallen away, 

By drunken days and weary tramps 

From pub to pub by city lamps 

Till men despise the game they started 

Till health and beauty are departed. 

And in a slum the reeking hag 

Mumbles a crust with toothy jag, 

Or gets the river's help to end 

The life too wrecked for man to mend. 

We spat and smoked and took our swipe 
Till Silas up and tap his pipe, 
And begged us all to pay attention 
Because he'd several things to mention. 
We'd seen the fight (Hear, hear. That's 

you); 
But still one task remained to do. 
That task was his, he didn't shun it, 



26 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

To give the purse to him as won it. 
With this remark, from start to out 
He'd never seen a brisker bout. 
There was the purse. At that he'd leave it. 
Let Kane come forward to receive it. 

I took the purse and hemmed and bowed, 
And called for gin punch for the crowd ; 
And when the second bowl was done, 
I called, ''Let's have another one." 
Si's wife come in and sipped and sipped 
(As women will) till she was pipped. 
And Si hit Dicky Twot a clouter 
Because he put his arm about her ; 
But after Si got overtasked 
She sat and kissed whoever asked. 
My Doxy Jane was splashed by this, 
I took her on my knee to kiss. 
And Tom cried out, "0 damn the gin ; 
Why can't we all have women in ? 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 27 

Bess Evans, now, or Sister Polly, 

Or those two housemaids at the Folly ? 

Let someone nip to Biddy Price's, 

They'd all come in a brace of trices. 

Rose Davies, Sue, and Betsy Perks ; 

One man, one girl, and damn all Turks." 

But, no. ''More gin," they cried; ''Come 

on. 
We'll have the girls in when it's gone." 
So round the gin went, hot and heady, 
Hot Hollands punch on top of deady. 

Hot Hollands punch on top of stout 
Puts madness in and wisdom out. 
From drunken man to drunken man 
The drunken madness raged and ran. 
"I'm climber Joe who chmbed the spire." 
"You're climber Joe the bloody liar." 
"Who says I lie?" "I do." 

"You lie, 



28 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

I climbed the spire and had a fly." 

''I'm French Suzanne, the Circus Dancer, 

I'm going to dance a bloody Lancer." 

''If I'd my rights I'm Squire's heir." 

"By rights I'd be a millionaire." 

"By rights I'd be the lord of you, 

But Farmer Scriggins had his do, 

He done me, so I've had to hoove it, 

I've got it all wrote down to prove it. 

And one of these dark winter nights 

He'll learn I mean to have my rights ; 

I'll bloody him a bloody fix, 

I'll bloody burn his bloody ricks." 

From three long hours of gin and smokes, 
And two girls' breath and fifteen blokes, 
A warmish night, and windows shut. 
The room stank like a fox's gut. 
The heat and smell and drinking deep 
Began to stun the gang to sleep. 



THE EVERLASTING MEBCY 29 

Some fell downstairs to sleep on the mat, 
Some snored it sodden where they sat. 
Dick Twot had lost a tooth and wept, 
But all the drunken others slept. 
Jane slept beside me in the chair, 
And I got up ; I wanted air. 

I opened window wide and leaned 
Out of that pigstye of the fiend 
And felt a cool wind go like grace 
About the sleeping market-place. 
The clock struck three, and sweetly, slowly. 
The bells chimed Holy, Holy, Holy ; 
And in a second's pause there fell 
The cold note of the chapel bell, 
And then a cock crew, flapping wings. 
And summat made me think of things. 
How long those ticking clocks had gone 
From church and chapel, on and on. 
Ticking the time out, ticking slow 



30 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

To men and girls who'd come and go, 
And how they ticked in belfry dark 
When half the town was bishop's park, 
And how they'd rung a chime full tilt 
The night after the church was built, 
And how that night was Lambert's Feast, 
The night I'd fought and been a beast. 
And how a change had come. And then 
I thought, ''You tick to different men." 

What with the fight and what with drinking 
And being awake alone there thinking, 
My mind began to carp and tetter, 
"If this life's all, the beasts are better." 
And then I thought, "I wish I'd seen 
The many towns this town has been; 
I wish I knew if they'd a-got 
A kind of summat we've a-not. 
If them as built the church so fair 
Were half the chaps folk say they were; 



THE EVERLASTING MEBCT 31 

For they'd the skill to draw their plan, 

And skill's a joy to any man ; 

And they'd the strength, not skill alone, 

To build it beautiful in stone ; 

And strength and skill together thus 

O, they were happier men than us. 

But if they were, they had to die 
The same as every one and I. 
And no one lives again, but dies, 
And all the bright goes out of eyes. 
And all the skill goes out of hands. 
And all the wise brain understands. 
And all the beauty, all the power 
Is cut down like a withered flower. 
In all the show from birth to rest 
I give the poor dumb cattle best." 

I wondered, then, why Hfe should be, 
And what would be the end of me 



32 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

When youth and health and strength were 

gone 
And cold old age came creeping on ? 
A keeper's gun ? The Union ward ? 
Or that new quod at Hereford ? 
And looking round I felt disgust 
At all the nights of drink and lust, 
And all the looks of all the swine 
Who'd said that they were friends of mine ; 
And yet I knew, when morning came. 
The morning would be just the same, 
For I'd have drinks and Jane would meet me 
And drunken Silas Jones would greet me. 
And I'd risk quod and keeper's gun 
Till all the silly game was done. 
''For parson chaps are mad, supposin' 
A chap can change the road he's chosen." 
And then the Devil whispered, ''Saul, 
Why should you want to live at all ? 
Why fret and sweat and try to mend ? 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 33 

It's all the same thing in the end. 
But when it's done," he said, "it's ended. 
Why stand it, since it can't be mended ?" 
And in my heart I heard him plain, 
''Throw yourself down and end it, Kane." 

" Why not ? " said I. " Why not ? But no. 
I won't. I've never had my go. 
I've not had all the world can give. 
Death by and by, but first I'll live. 
The world owes me my time of times. 
And that time's coming now, by crimes." 

A madness took me then. I felt 
I'd like to hit the world a belt. 
I felt that I could fly through air, 
A screaming star with blazing hair, 
A rushing comet, crackhng, numbing 
The folk with fear of judgment coming, 
A 'Lijah in a fiery car. 
Coming to tell folk what they are. 



34 THE EVERLASTING MEBCY 

" That's what I'll do," I shouted loud, 

''I'll tell this sanctimonious crowd 

This town of window peeping, prying, 

Mahgning, peering, hinting, lying, 

Male and female human blots 

Who would, but daren't be, whores and 

sots. 
That they're so steeped in petty vice 
That they're less excellent than lice, 
That they're so soaked in petty virtue 
That touching one of them will dirt you. 
Dirt you with the stain of mean 
Cheating trade and going between, 
Pinching, starving, scraping, hoarding, 
Spying through the chinks of boarding 
To see if Sue, the prentice lean. 
Dares to touch the margarine. 
Fawning, cringing, oiling boots. 
Raging in the crowd's pursuits. 
Flinging stones at all the Stephens, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 35 

Standing firm with all the evens, 
Making hell for all the odd, 
All the lonely ones of God, 
Those poor lonely ones who find 
Dogs more mild than human kind. 
For dogs," I said, ''are nobles born 
To most of you, you cockled corn. 
I've known dogs to leave their dinner, 
Nosing a kind heart in a sinner. 
Poor old Crafty wagged his tail 
The day I first came home from jail. 
When all my folk, so primly clad, 
Glowered black and thought me mad. 
And muttered how they'd been respected. 
While I was what they'd all expected. 
(I've thought of that old dog for years. 
And of how near I come to tears.) 

But you, you minds of bread and cheese. 
Are less divine than that dog's fleas. 



36 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

You suck blood from kindly friends, 
And kill them when it serves your ends. 
Double traitors, double black, 
Stabbing only in the back, 
Stabbing with the knives you borrow 
From the friends you bring to sorrow. 
You stab all that's true and strong, 
Truth and strength you say are wrong, 
Meek and mild, and sweet and creeping, 
Repeating, canting, cadging, peeping, 
That's the art and that's the life 
To win a man his neighbour's wife. 
All that's good and all that's true, 
You kill that, so I'll kill you." 

At that I tore my clothes in shreds 
And hurled them on the window leads ; 
I flung my boots through both the winders 
And knocked the glass to little flinders ; 
The punch bowl and the tumblers followed, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 37 

And then I seized the lamps and holloed, 

And down the stairs, and tore back bolts. 

As mad as twenty blooded colts ; 

And out into the street I pass. 

As mad as two-year-olds at grass, 

A naked madman waving grand 

A blazing lamp in either hand. 

I yelled like twenty drunken sailors, 

"The devil's come among the tailors." 

A blaze of flame behind me streamed. 

And then I clashed the lamps and screamed 

''I'm Satan, newly come from hell." 

And then I spied the fire bell. 

I've been a ringer, so I know 
How best to make a big bell go. 
So on to bell-rope swift I swoop. 
And stick my one foot in the loop 
And heave a down-swig till I groan, 
"Awake, you swine, you devil's own." 



38 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

I made the fire-bell awake, 
I felt the bell-rope throb and shake ; 
I felt the air mingle and clang 
And beat the walls a muffled bang, 
And stifle back and boom and bay 
Like muffled peals on Boxing Day, 
And then surge up and gather shape, 
And spread great pinions and escape ; 
And each great bird of clanging shrieks 

Fire ! Fire, from iron beaks. 

My shoulders cracked to send around 
Those shrieking birds made out of sound 
With news of fire in their bills. 
(They heard 'em plain beyond Wall Hills.) 

Up go the winders, out come heads, 

1 heard the springs go creak in beds ; 
But still I heave and sweat and tire, 
And stiU the clang goes ''Fire, Fire !" 
"Where is it, then ? Who is it, there ? 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 39 

You ringer, stop, and tell us where." 
"Run round and let the Captain know." 
"It must be bad, he's ringing so." 
"It's in the town, I see the flame ; 
Look there ! Look there, how red it came." 
"Where is it, then ? stop the bell." 
I stopped and called : "It's fire of hell ; 
And this is Sodom and Gomorrah, 
And now I'll burn you up, begorra." 

By this the firemen were mustering. 

The half-dressed stable men were flustering, 

Backing the horses out of stalls 

While this man swears and that man bawls, 

"Don't take th' old mare. Back, Toby, 

back. 
Back, Lincoln. Where's the fire, Jack?" 
"Damned if I know. Out Preston way." 
"No. It's at Chancey's Pitch, they say." 
"It's sixteen ricks at Pauntley burnt." 



40 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

''You back old Darby out, I durn't." 
They ran the big red engine out, 
And put 'em to with damn and shout. 
And then they start to raise the shire, 
"Who brought the news, and where's the 

fire?" 
They'd moonhght, lamps, and gas to light 

'em. 
I give a screech-owl's screech to fright 'em, 
And snatch from underneath their noses 
The nozzles of the fire hoses. 
"I am the fire. Back, stand back. 
Or else I'll fetch your skulls a crack ; 
D'you see these copper nozzles here ? 
They weigh ten pounds apiece, my dear ; 
I'm fire of hell come up this minute 
To burn this town, and all that's in it. 
To burn you dead and burn you clean, 
You cogwheels in a stopped machine, 
You hearts of snakes, and brains of pigeons, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 41 

You dead devout of dead religions, 
You offspring of the hen and ass, 
By Pilate ruled, and Caiaphas. 
Now your account is totted. Learn 
Hell's flames are loose and you shall burn." 

At that I leaped and screamed and ran, 
I heard their cries go, "Catch him, man." 
''Who was it?" ''Down him." "Out him, 

Ern." 
"Duck him at pump, we'll see who'll 

burn." 
A policeman clutched, a fireman clutched, 
A dozen others snatched and touched. 
"By God, he's stripped down to his buff." 
"By God, we'll make him warm enough." 
"After him," "Catch him," "Out him," 

"Scrob him." 
"We'll give him hell." "By God, we'll mob 

him." 



42 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

"We'll duck him, scrout him, flog him, fratch 

him." 
"All right," I said. "But first you'll catch 

him." 

The men who don't know to the root 
The joy of being swift of foot, 
Have never known divine and fresh 
The glory of the gift of flesh, 
Nor felt the feet exult, nor gone 
Along a dim road, on and on. 
Knowing again the bursting glows, 
The mating hare in April knows. 
Who tingles to the pads with mirth 
At being the swiftest thing on earth. 
O, if you want to know dehght. 
Run naked in an autumn night. 
And laugh, as I laughed then, to find 
A running rabble drop behind. 
And whang, on every door you pass. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 43 

Two copper nozzles, tipped with brass, 

And doubly whang at every turning, 

And yell, "All hell's let loose, and burning." 

I beat my brass and shouted fire 
At doors of parson, lawyer, squire. 
At all three doors I threshed and slammed 
And yelled aloud that they were damned. 
I clodded squire's glass with turves 
Because he spring-gunned his preserves. 
Through parson's glass my nozzle swishes 
Because he stood for loaves and fishes, 
But parson's glass I spared a tittle. 
He give me a orange once when little, 
And he who gives a child a treat 
Makes joy-bells ring in Heaven's street, 
And he who gives a child a home 
Builds palaces in Kingdom come, 
And she who gives a baby birth 
Brings Saviour Christ again to Earth, 



44 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

For life is joy, and mind is fruit, 
And body's precious earth and root. 
But lawyer's glass — well, never mind, 
Th'old Adam's strong in me, I find. 
God pardon man, and may God's son 
Forgive the evil things I've done. 

What more ? By Dirty Lane I crept 

Back to the Lion, where I slept. 

The raging madness hot and floodin' 

Boiled itself out and left me sudden, 

Left me worn out and sick and cold. 

Aching as though I'd all grown old ; 

So there I lay, and there they found me 

On door-mat, with a curtain round me. 

Si took my heels and Jane my head 

And laughed, and carried me to bed. 

And from the neighbouring street they 

reskied 
My boots and trousers, coat and weskit ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 45 

They bath-bricked both the nozzles bright 
To be mementoes of the night, 
And knowing what I should awake with 
They flannelled me a quart to slake with, 
And sat and shook till half past two 
Expecting Police Inspector Drew. 

I woke and drank, and went to meat 
In clothes still dirty from the street. 
Down in the bar I heard 'em tell 
How someone rang the fire bell, 
And how th' inspector's search had thriven, 
And how five pounds reward was given. 
And Shepherd Boyce, of Marley, glad us 
By saying it was blokes from mad 'us, 
Or two young rips lodged at the Prince 
Whom none had seen nor heard of since, 
Or that young blade from Worcester Walk 
(You know how country people talk). 
Young Joe the ostler come in sad. 



46 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

He said th'old mare had bit his dad. 

He said there' d come a blazing screeching 

Daft Bible-prophet chap a-preaching, 

Had put th'old mare in such a taking 

She'd thought the bloody earth was quaking. 

And others come and spread a tale 

Of cut-throats out of Gloucester jail, 

And how we needed extra cops 

With all them Welsh come picking hops ; 

With drunken Welsh in all our sheds 

We might be murdered in our beds. 

By all accounts, both men and wives 
Had had the scare up of their lives. 

I ate and drank and gathered strength. 
And stretched along the bench full length, 
Or crossed to window seat to pat 
Black Silas Jones's little cat. 
At four I called, "You devil's own, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 47 

The second trumpet shall be blown. 

The second trump, the second blast ; 

Hell's flames are loosed, and judgment's 



Too late for mercy now. Take warning. 
I'm death and hell and Judgment morning." 
I hurled the bench into the settle, 
I banged the table on the kettle, 
I sent Joe's quart of cider spinning. 
'^Lo, here begins my second inning." 
Each bottle, mug, and jug and pot 
I smashed to crocks in half a tot ; 
And Joe, and Si, and Nick, and Percy 
I rolled together topsy versy. 
And as I ran I heard 'em call, 
''Now damn to hell, what's gone with 
Saul?" 

Out into street I ran uproarious 
The devil dancing in me glorious. 



48 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

And as I ran I yell and shriek 

''Come on, now, turn the other cheek." 

Across the way by almshouse pump 

I see old puffing parson stump. 

Old parson, red-eyed as a ferret 

From nightly wrestlings with the spirit ; 

I ran across, and barred his path. 

His turkey gills went red as wrath 

And then he froze, as parsons can. 

''The police will deal with you, my man." 

"Not yet," said I, "not yet they won't; 

And now you'll hear me, Uke or don't. 

The English Church both is and was 

A subsidy of Caiaphas. 

I don't believe in Prayer nor Bible, 

They're lies all through, and you're a libel, 

A libel on the Devil's plan 

When first he miscreated man. 

You mumble through a formal code 

To get which martyrs burned and glowed. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 49 

I look on martyrs as mistakes, 

But still they burned for it at stakes ; 

Your only fire's the jolly fire 

Where you can guzzle port with Squire, 

And back and praise his damned opinions 

About his temporal dominions. 

You let him give the man who digs, 

A filthy hut unfit for pigs, 

Without a well, without a drain. 

With mossy thatch that lets in rain. 

Without a 'lotment, 'less he rent it, 

And never meat, unless he scent it. 

But weekly doles of 'leven shilling ■ 

To make a grown man strong and willing. 

To do the hardest work on earth 

And feed his wife when she gives birth, 

And feed his little children's bones. 

I tell you, man, the Devil groans. 

With all your main and all your might 

You back what is against what's right ; 



60 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

You let the Squire do things Uke these, 
You back him in't and give him ease, 
You take his hand, and drink his wine, 
And he's a hog, but you're a swine. 
For you take gold to teach God's ways 
And teach man how to sing God's praise. 
And now I'll tell you what you teach 
In downright honest English speech. 

''You teach the ground-down starving man 

That Squire's greed's Jehovah's plan. 

You get his learning circumvented 

Lest it should make him discontented 

(Better a brutal, starving nation 

Than men with thoughts above their station), 

You let him neither read nor think. 

You goad his wretched soul to drink 

And then to jail, the drunken boor ; 

O sad intemperance of the poor. 

You starve his soul till it's rapscalHon, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 51 

Then blame his flesh for being stalUon. 
You send your wife around to paint 
The golden glories of "restraint." 
How moral exercise bewild'rin' 
Would soon result in fewer children. 
You work a day in Squire's fields 
And see what sweet restraint it yields, 
A woman's day at turnip picking, 
Your heart's too fat for plough or ricking. 

"And you whom luck taught French and 

Greek 
Have purple flaps on either cheek, 
A stately house, and time for knowledge. 
And gold to send your sons to college. 
That pleasant place, where getting learning 
Is also key to money earning. 
But quite your damndest want of grace 
Is what you do to save your face ; 
The way you sit astride the gates 



62 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

By padding wages out of rates ; 
Your Christmas gifts of shoddy blankets 
That every working soul may thank its 
Loving parson, loving squire 
Through whom he can't afford a fire. 
Your well-packed bench, your prison pen, 
To keep them something less than men ; 
Your friendly clubs to help 'em bury, 
Your charities of midwifery. 
Your bidding children duck and cap 
To them who give them workhouse pap. 
O, what you are, and what you preach. 
And what you do, and what you teach 
Is not God's Word, nor honest schism, 
But Devil's cant and pauperism." 

By this time many folk had gathered 
To Usten to me while I blathered ; 
I said my piece, and when I'd said it, 
I'll do old purple parson credit. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 53 

He sunk (as sometimes parsons can) 

His coat's excuses in the man. 

''You think that Squire and I are kings 

Who made the existing state of things, 

And made it ill. I answer, No, 

States are not made, nor patched ; they grow, 

Grow slow through centuries of pain 

And grow correctly in the main, 

But only grow by certain laws 

Of certain bits in certain jaws. 

You want to doctor that. Let be. 

You cannot patch a growing tree. 

Put these two words beneath your hat, 

These two : securus judicat. 

The social states of human kinds 

Are made by multitudes of minds, 

And after multitudes of years 

A little human growth appears 

Worth having, even to the soul 

Who sees most plain it's not the whole. 



64 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

This state is dull and evil, both, 

I keep it in the path of growth ; 

You think the Church an outworn fetter ; 

Kane, keep it, till you've built a better. 

And keep the existing social state ; 

I quite agree it's out of date, 

One does too much, another shirks. 

Unjust, I grant ; but still ... it works. 

To get the whole world out of bed 

And washed, and dressed, and warmed, and 

fed. 
To work, and back to bed again. 
Believe me, Saul, costs worlds of pain. 
Then, as to whether true or sham 
That book of Christ, Wtiose priest I am ; 
The Bible is a lie, say you. 
Where do you stand, suppose it true ? 
Good-bye. But if you've more to say, 
My doors are open night and day. 
Meanwhile, my friend, 'twould be no sin 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 55 

To mix more water in your gin. 

We're neither saints nor Philip Sidneys, 

But mortal men with mortal kidneys." 

He took his snuff, and wheezed a greeting, 
And waddled off to mothers' meeting ; 
I hung my head upon my chest, 
I give old purple parson best. 
For while the Plough tips round the Pole 
The trained mind outs the upright soul, 
As Jesus said the trained mind might, 
Being wiser than the sons of light, 
But trained men's minds are spread so thin 
They let all sorts of darkness in ; " 

Whatever light man finds they doubt it 
They love, not light, but talk about it. 

But parson'd proved to people's eyes 
That I was drunk, and he was wise ; 
And people grinned and women tittered. 
And Uttle children mocked and twittered. 



66 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

So, blazing mad, I stalked to bar 

To show how noble drunkards are. 

And guzzled spirits like a beast. 

To show contempt for Church and priest, 

Until, by six, my wits went round 

Like hungry pigs in parish pound. 

At half past six, rememb'ring Jane, 

I staggered into street again 

With mind made up (or primed with gin) 

To bash the cop who'd run me in ; 

For well I knew I'd have to cock up 

My legs that night inside the lock-up. 

And it was my most fixed intent 

To have a fight before I went. 

Our Fates are strange, and no one knows his 

Our lovely Saviour Christ disposes. 

Jane wasn't where we'd planned, the jade. 
She'd thought me drunk and hadn't stayed. 
So I went up the Walk to look for her 



THE EVEELASTING MERCY 57 

And lingered by the little brook for her, 
And dowsed my face, and drank at spring, 
And watched two wild duck on the wing. 
The moon come pale, the wind come cool, 
A big pike leapt in Lower Pool, 
The peacock screamed, the clouds were strak- 

ing, 
My cut cheek felt the weather breaking ; 
An orange sunset waned and thinned 
Foretelhng rain and western wind, 
And while I watched I heard distinct 
The metals on the railway clinked. 
The blood-edged clouds were all in tatters, 
The sky and earth seemed mad as hatters ; 
They had a death look, wild and odd. 
Of something dark foretold by God. 
And seeing it so, I felt so shaken 
I wouldn't keep the road I'd taken. 
But wandered back towards the inn 
Resolved to brace myself with gin. 



68 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

And as I walked, I said, "It's strange, 
There's Death let loose to-night, and 
Change." 

In Cabbage Walk I made a haul 
Of two big pears from lawyer's wall, 
And, munching one, I took the lane 
Back into Market-place again. 
Lamp-hghter Dick had passed the turning^ 
And all the Homend lamps were burning. 
The windows shone, the shops were busy, 
But that strange Heaven made me dizzy. 
The sky had all God's warning writ 
In bloody marks all over it, 
And over all I thought there was 
A ghastly light besides the gas. 
The Devil's tasks and Devil's rages 
Were giving me the Devil's wages. 

In Market-place it's always light, 
The big shop windows make it bright ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 59 

And in the press of people buying 

I spied a little fellow crying 

Because his mother'd gone inside 

And left him there, and so he cried. 

And mother'd beat him when she found him, 

And mother's whip would curl right round 

him. 
And mother'd say he'd done't to crost her, 
Though there being crowds about he'd lost 

her. 

I Lord, give to men who are old and rougher 

i 

i The things that little children suffer. 

And let keep bright and undefiled 

The young years of the little child. 

I pat his head at edge of street 

And gi'm my second pear to eat. 

Right under lamp, I pat his head, 

''I'll stay till mother come," I said, 

And stay I did, and joked and talked, 



60 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

And shoppers wondered as they walked. 
''There's that Saul Kane, the drunken blag- 

gard, 
Talking to little Jimmy Jaggard. 
The drunken blaggard reeks of drink." 
"Whatever will his mother think?" 
''Wherever has his mother gone? 
Nip round to Mrs. Jaggard's, John, 
And say her Jimmy's out again, 
In Market place, with boozer Kane." 
"When he come out to-day he staggered. 
O, Jimmy Jaggard, Jimmy Jaggard." 
"His mother's gone inside to bargain, 
Run in and tell her, Polly Margin, 
And tell her poacher Kane is tipsy 
And selhng Jimmy to a gipsy." 
"Run in to Mrs. Jaggard, Ellen, 
Or else, dear knows, there'll be no tellin', 
And don't dare leave yer till you've fount 

her, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 61 

You'll find her at the linen counter." 
I told a tale, to Jim's delight, 
Of where the tom-cats go by night, 
And how when moonlight come they went 
Among the chimneys black and bent, 
From roof to roof, from house to house, 
With little baskets full of mouse 
All red and white, both joint and chop 
Like meat out of a butcher's shop ; 
Then all along the wall they creep 
And everyone is fast asleep. 
And honey-hunting moths go by, 
And by the bread-batch crickets cry ; 
Then on they hurry, never waiting 
To lawyer's backyard cellar grating 
Where Jaggard's cat, with clever paw, 
Unhooks a broke-brick's secret door ; 
Then down into the cellar black. 
Across the wood slug's slimy track. 
Into an old cask's quiet hollow, 



62 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Where they've got seats for what's to follow ; 

Then each tom-cat lights little candles, 

And 0, the stories and the scandals, 

And 0, the songs and Christmas carols. 

And 0, the milk from little barrels. 

They light a fire fit for roasting 

(And how good mouse-meat smells when 

toasting), 
Then down they sit to merry feast 
While moon goes west and sun comes east. 

Sometimes they make so merry there 

Old lawyer come to head of stair 

To 'fend with fist and poker took firm 

His parchments channelled by the bookworm. 

And all his deeds, and all his packs 

Of withered ink and sealing wax ; 

And there he stands, with candle raised. 

And listens like a man amazed, 

Or like a ghost a man stands dumb at, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 63 

He says, "Hush ! Hush ! I'm sure there's 

summat." 
He hears outside the brown owl call, 
He hears the death-tick tap the wall. 
The gnawing of the wainscot mouse. 
The creaking up and down the house. 
The unhooked window's hinges ranging, 
The sounds that say the wind is changing. 
At last he turns, and shakes his head, 
''It's nothing, I'll go back to bed." 

And just then Mrs. Jaggard came 
To view and end her Jimmy's shame. 

She made one rush and gi'm a bat 

And shook him like a dog a rat. 

''I can't turn round but what you're straying. 

I'll give you tales and gipsy playing. 

I'll give you wand 'ring off like this 

And hstening to whatever 'tis. 



64 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

You'll laugh the little side of the can, 
You'll have the whip for this, my man ; 
And not a bite of meat nor bread 
You'll touch before you go to bed. 
Some day you'll break your mother's heart, 
After God knows she's done her part, 
Working her arms off day and night 
Trying to keep your collars white. 
Look at your face, too, in the street. 
What dirty filth've you found to eat ? 
Now don't you blubber here, boy, or 
I'll give you sum't to blubber for." 
She snatched him off from where we stand 
And knocked the pear-core from his hand, 
And looked at me, ''You Devil's limb, 
How dare you talk to Jaggard's Jim ; 
You drunken, poaching, boozing brute, you, 
If Jaggard was a man he'd shoot you." 
She glared all this, but didn't speak, 
She gasped, white hollows in her cheek ; 



TEE EVERLASTING MERCY 65 

Jimmy was writhing, screaming wild, 
The shoppers thought I'd killed the child. 

I had to speak, so I begun. 

"You'd oughtn't beat your little son; 

He did no harm, but seeing him there 

I talked to him and gi'm a pear ; 

I'm sure the poor child meant no wrong, 

It's all my fault he stayed so long, 

He'd not have stayed, mum, I'll be bound 

If I'd not chanced to come around. 

It's all my fault he stayed, not his. 

I kept him here, that's how it is." 

"Oh ! And how dare you, then?" says she, 

"How dare you tempt my boy from me ? 

How dare you do't, you drunken swine, 

Is he your child or is he mine ? 

A drunken sot they've had the beak to, 

Has got his dirty whores to speak to. 

His dirty mates with whom he drink, 



66 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Not little children, one would think. 

Look on him, there," she says, ''look on him 

And smell the stinking gin upon him, 

The lowest sot, the drunknest liar, 

The dirtiest dog in all the shire : 

Nice friends for any woman's son 

After ten years, and all she's done. 

"For I've had eight, and buried five. 
And only three are left alive. 
I've given them all we could afford. 
I've taught them all to fear the Lord. 
They've had the best we had to give, 
The only three the Lord let live. 

"For Minnie whom I loved the worst 
Died mad in childbed with her first. 
And John and Mary died of measles, 
And Rob was drownded at the Teasels. 
And little Nan, dear little sweet, 
A cart run over in the street ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 67 

Her little shift was all one stain, 
I prayed God put her out of pain. 
And all the rest are gone or going 
The road to hell, and there's no knowing 
For all I've done and all I've made them 
I'd better not have overlaid them. 
For Susan went the ways of shame 
The time the 'till'ry regiment came. 
And t'have her child without a father 
I think I'd have her buried rather. 
And Dicky boozes, God forgimme. 
And now't's to be the same with Jimmy. 
And all I've done and all I've bore 
Has made a drunkard and a whore, 
A bastard boy who wasn't meant. 
And Jimmy gwine where Dicky went ; 
For Dick began the self-same way 
And my old hairs are going gray, 
And my poor man's a withered knee, 
And all the burden falls on me. 



68 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

''I've washed eight little children's limbs, 

I've taught eight little souls their hymns, 

I've risen sick and lain down pinched 

And borne it all and never flinched ; 

But to see him, the town's disgrace. 

With God's commandments broke in's face, 

Who never worked, not he, nor earned, 

Nor will do till the seas are burned, 

Who never did since he was whole 

A hand's turn for a human soul. 

But poached and stole and gone with women, 

And swilled down gin enough to swim in. 

To see him only lift one finger 

To make my little Jimmy linger. 

In spite of all his mother's prayers, 

And all her ten long years of cares, 

And all her broken spirit's cry 

That drunkard's finger puts them by. 

And Jimmy turns. And now I see 

That just as Dick was, Jim will be, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 69 

And all my life will have been vain. 
I might have spared myself the pain, 
And done the world a blessed riddance 
If I'd a drowned 'em all like kittens. 
And he the sot, so strong and proud. 
Who'd make white shirts of 's mother's shroud, 
He laughs now, it's a joke to him. 
Though it's the gates of hell to Jim. 

''I've had my heart burnt out like coal. 
And drops of blood wrung from my soul 
Day in, day out, in pain and tears, 
For five and twenty wretched years ; 
And he, he's ate the fat and sweet. 
And loafed and spat at top of street. 
And drunk and leched from day till morrow, 
And never known a moment's sorrow. 
He come out drunk from th' inn to look 
The day my little Nan was took ; 
He sat there drinking, glad and gay. 



70 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

The night my girl was led astray ; 

He praised my Dick for singing well, 

The night Dick took the road to hell ; 

And when my corpse goes stiff and blind, 

Leaving four helpless souls behind. 

He will be there still, drunk and strong. 

It do seem hard. It do seem wrong. 

But 'Woe to him by whom the offence,' 

Says our Lord Jesus' Testaments. 

Whatever seems, God doth not slumber 

Though he lets pass times without number. 

He'll come with trump to call his own. 

And this world's way'll be overthrown. 

He'll come with glory and with fire 

To cast great darkness on the liar. 

To burn the drunkard and the treacher, 

And do his judgment on the lecher, 

To glorify the spirits' faces 

Of those whose ways were stony places, 

Who chose with Ruth the better part ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 71 

O Lord, I see Thee as Thou art, 

God, the fiery four-edged sword, 
The thunder of the wrath outpoured, 
The fiery four-faced creatures burning. 
And all the four-faced wheels all turning, 
Coming with trump and fiery saint. 
Jim, take me home, I'm turning faint." 
They went, and some cried, ''Good old sod." 
''She put it to him straight, by God." 

Summat she was, or looked, or said. 
Went home and made me hang my head. 

1 slunk away into the night 
Knowing deep down that she was right. 
I'd often heard religious ranters. 

And put them down as windy canters, 
But this old mother made me see 
The harm I done by being me. 
Being both strong and given to sin 
I 'tracted weaker vessels in. 



72 THE EVERLASTING MEBCT 

So back to bar to get more drink, 

I didn't dare begin to think, 

And there were drinks and drunken singing. 

As though this life were dice for flinging ; 

Dice to be flung, and nothing furder. 

And Christ's blood just another murder. 

"Come on, drinks round, salue, drink hearty, 

Now, Jane, the punch-bowl for the party. 

If any here won't drink with me 

I'll knock his bloody eyes out. See ? 

Come on, cigars round, rum for mine. 

Sing us a smutty song, some swine." 

But though the drinks and songs went round 

That thought remained, it was not drowned. 

And when I'd rise to get a light 

I'd think, ''What's come to me to-night ?" 

There's always crowds when drinks are stand- 
ing. 
The house doors slammed along the landing, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 73 

The rising wind was gusty yet, 

And those who came in late were wet ; 

And all my body's nerves were snappin' 

With sense of summat 'bout to happen, 

And music seemed to come and go 

And seven lights danced in a row. 

There used to be a custom then. 

Miss Bourne, the Friend, went round at ten 

To all the pubs in all the place. 

To bring the drunkards^ souls to grace ; 

Some sulked, of course, and some were stirred. 

But none give her a dirty word. 

A tall pale woman, grey and bent. 

Folk said of her that she was sent. 

She wore Friends' clothes, and women smiled, 

But she'd a heart just like a child. 

She come to us near closing time 

When we were at some smutty rhyme, 

And I was mad, and ripe for fun ; 

I wouldn't a minded what I done. 



74 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

So when she come so prim and grey 

I pound the bar and sing, ''Hooray, 

Here's Quaker come to bless and kiss us. 

Come, have a gin and bitters, missus. 

Or may be Quaker girls so prim 

Would rather start a bloody hymn. 

Now Dick, oblige. A hymn, you swine, 

Pipe up the 'Officer of the Line,' 

A song to make one's belly ache, 

Or 'Nell and Roger at the Wake,' 

Or that sweet song, the talk in town, 

'The lady fair and Abel Brown.' 

'O, who's that knocking at the door,' 

Miss Bourne'll play the music score." 

The men stood dumb as cattle are. 

They grinned, but thought I'd gone too far, 

There come a hush and no one break it. 

They wondered how Miss Bourne would 

take it. 
She up to me with black eyes wide. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 75 

She looked as though her spirit cried ; 
She took my tumbler from the bar 
Beside where all the matches are 
And poured it out upon the floor dust, 
Among the fag-ends, spit and saw-dust, 

"Saul Kane," she said, ''when next you drink. 
Do me the gentleness to think 
That every drop of drink accursed 
Makes Christ within you die of thirst. 
That every dirty word you say 
Is one more flint upon His way. 
Another thorn about His head, 
Another mock by where He tread, 
Another nail, another cross. 
All that you are is that Christ's loss." 
The clock run down and struck a chime 
And Mrs. Si said, ''Closing time." 

The wet was pelting on the pane 
And something broke inside my brain, 



76 THE EVERLASTING MEBGY 

I heard the rain drip from the gutters 

And Silas putting up the shutters, 

While one by one the drinkers went ; 

I got a glimpse of what it meant, 

How she and I had stood before 

In some old town by some old door 

Waiting intent while someone knocked 

Before the door for ever locked ; 

She was so white that I was scared, 

A gas jet, turned the wrong way, flared, 

And Silas snapped the bars in place. 

Miss Bourne stood white and searched my face. 

When Silas done, with ends of tunes 

He 'gan a gathering the spittoons. 

His wife primmed lips and took the till. 

Miss Bourne stood still and I stood still, 

And ''Tick. Slow. Tick. Slow" went the clock. 

She said, ''He waits until you knock." 

She turned at that and went out swift. 

Si grinned and winked, his missus sniffed. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 77 

I heard her clang the Lion door, 

I marked a drink-drop roll to floor ; 

It took up scraps of sawdust, furry, 

And crinkled on, a half inch, blurry ; 

A drop from my last glass of gin ; 

And someone waiting to come in, 

A hand upon the door latch gropen 

Knocking the man inside to open. 

I know the very words I said, 

They bayed like bloodhounds in my head. 

''The water's going out to sea 

And there's a great moon calling me ; 

But there's a great sun calls the moon, 

And all God's bells will carol soon 

For joy and glory and delight 

Of someone coming home to-night." 

Out into darkness, out to night. 
My flaring heart gave plenty light. 
So wild it was there was no knowing 



78 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Whether the clouds or stars were blowing ; 
Blown chimney pots and folk blown blind, 
And puddles glimmering like my mind, 
And chinking glass from windows banging, 
And inn signs swung like people hanging, 
And in my heart the drink unpriced. 
The burning cataracts of Christ. 

I did not think, I did not strive, 

The deep peace burnt my me alive ; 

The bolted door had broken in, 

I knew that I had done with sin. 

I knew that Christ had given me birth 

To brother all the souls on earth. 

And every bird and every beast 

Should share the crumbs broke at the feast. 

O glory of the lighted mind. \/ 

How dead I'd been, how dumb, how blind. 
The station brook, to my new eyes. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 79 

Was babbling out of Paradise, 
The waters rushing from the rain 
Were singing Christ has risen again. 
I thought all earthly creatures knelt 
From rapture of the joy I felt. 
The narrow station-wall's brick ledge, 
The wild hop withering in the hedge, 
The lights in huntsman's upper storey 
Were parts of an eternal glory, 
Were God's eternal garden flowers. 
I stood in bliss at this for hours. 

glory of the lighted soul. 
The dawn came up on Bradlow Knoll, V-* 
The dawn with glittering on the grasses. 
The dawn which pass and never passes. 

''It's dawn," I said, ''And chimney's smok- 
ing, 
And all the blessed fields are soaking. 



80 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

It's dawn, and there's an engine shunting ; 
And hounds, for huntsman's going hunting. 
It's dawn, and I must wander north 
Along the road Christ led me forth." 

So up the road I wander slow 

Past where the snowdrops used to grow 

With celandines in early springs, 

When rainbows were triumphant things 

And dew so bright and flowers so glad, 

Eternal joy to lass and lad. 

And past the lovely brook I paced, 

The brook whose source I never traced. 

The brook, the one of two which rise 

In my green dream in Paradise, 

In wells where heavenly buckets chnk 

To give God's wandering thirsty drink 

By those clean cots of carven stone 

Where the clear water sings alone. 

Then down, past that white-blossomed pond, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 81 

And past the chestnut trees beyond, 
And past the bridge the fishers knew, 
Where yellow flag flowers once grew, 
Where we'd go gathering cops of clover. 
In sunny June times long since over. 
clover-cops half white, half red, 
beauty from beyond the dead. 
blossom, key to earth and heaven, 
souls that Christ has new forgiven. 

Then down the hill to gipsies' pitch 

By where the brook clucks in the ditch. 

A gipsy's camp was in the copse, 

Three felted tents, with beehive tops, 

And round black marks where fires had 

been, 
And one old waggon painted gi'een. 
And three ribbed horses wrenching grass. 
And three wild boys to watch me pass. 
And one old woman by the fire 



82 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Hulking a rabbit warm from wire. 
I loved to see the horses bait. 
I felt I walked at Heaven's gate, 
That Heaven's gate was opened wide 
Yet still the gipsies camped outside. 
The waste souls will prefer the wild, 
Long after life is meek and mild. 
Perhaps when man has entered in 
His perfect city free from sin, 
The campers will come past the walls 
With old lame horses full of galls, 
And waggons hung about with withies. 
And burning coke in tinker's stithies, 
And see the golden town, and choose, 
And think the wild too good to lose. 
And camp outside, as these camped then 
With wonder at the entering men. 
So past, and past the stone heap white 
That dewberry trailers hid from sight. 
And down the field so full of springs, 



THE EVERLASTING MEBCT 83 

Where mewing peewits clap their wings, 
And past the trap made for the mill 
Into the field below the hill. 
There was a mist along the stream, 
A wet mist, dim, like in a dream ; 
I heard the heavy breath of cows. 
And waterdrops from th'alder boughs ; 
And eels, or snakes, in dripping grass, 
Whipping aside to let me pass. 
The gate was backed against the ryrnQ 
To pass the cows at milking time. 
And by the gate as I went out 
A moldwarp rooted earth wi's snout. 
A few steps up the Callows' Lane 
Brought me above the mist again. 
The two great fields arose like death 
Above the mists of human breath. 

All earthly things that blessed morning 
Were everlasting joy and warning. 



84 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

The gate was Jesus' way made plain, 
The mole was Satan foiled again, 
Black blinded Satan snouting way 
Along the red of Adam's clay ; 
The mist was error and damnation. 
The lane the road unto salvation. 
Out of the mist into the light, 
blessed gift of inner sight. 
The past was faded like a dream ; 
There come the jingling of a team, 
A ploughman's voice, a cHnk of chain, 
Slow hoofs, and harness under strain. 
Up the slow slope a team came bowing. 
Old Callow at his autumn ploughing, 
Old Callow, stooped above the hales, 
Ploughing the stubble into wales. 
His grave eyes looking straight ahead, 
Shearing a long straight furrow red ; 
His plough-foot high to give it earth 
To bring new food for men to birth. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 85 

O wet red swathe of earth laid bare, 
truth, strength, O gleaming share, 
O patient eyes that watch the goal, 
O ploughman of the sinner's soul. 
Jesus, drive the coulter deep 
To plough my living man from sleep. 

Slow up the hill the plough team plod. 
Old Callow at the task of God, 
Helped by man's wit, helped by the brute, 
Turning a stubborn clay to fruit, 
His eyes forever on some sign 
To help him plough a perfect line. 
At top of rise the plough team stopped. 
The fore-horse bent his head and cropped. 
Then the chains chack, the brasses jingle. 
The lean reins gather through the cringle. 
The figures move against the sky, 
The clay wave breaks as they go by. 
'I kneeled there in the muddy fallow, 



86 TEE EVERLASTING MERCY 

I knew that Christ was there with Callow, 
That Christ was standing there with me, 
That Christ had taught me what to be, 
That I should plough, and as I ploughed 
My Saviour Christ would sing aloud, 
And as I drove the clods apart 
Christ would be ploughing in my heart. 
Through rest-harrow and bitter roots, 
Through all my bad Hfe's rotten fruits. 

Christ who holds the open gate, 

O Christ who drives the furrow straight, 

O Christ, the plough, Christ, the laughter 

Of holy white birds flying after, 

Lo, all my heart's field red and torn. 

And Thou wilt bring the young green corn. 

The young green corn divinely springing, 

The young green corn forever singing ; 

And when the field is fresh and fair 

Thy blessed feet shall glitter there, 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 87 

And we will walk the weeded field, 
And tell the golden harvest's yield, 
The corn that makes the holy bread 
By which the soul of man is fed, 
The holy bread, the food unpriced, y 
Thy everlasting mercy, Christ. 

The share will jar on many a stone, 
Thou wilt not let me stand alone ; 
And I shall feel (thou wilt not fail). 
Thy hand on mine upon the hale. 
Near Bullen Bank, on Gloucester Road, 
Thy everlasting mercy showed 
The ploughman patient on the hill 
Forever there, forever still, 
Ploughing the hill with steady yoke 
Of pine-trees lightning-struck and broke. 
I've marked the May Hill ploughman stay 
There on his hill, day after day 
Driving his team against the sky, 



88 THE EVERLASTING MEBCT 

While men and women live and die. 

And now and then he seems to stoop 

To clear the coulter with the scoop, 

Or touch an ox to haw or gee 

While Severn stream goes out to sea. 

The sea with all her ships and sails, 

And that great smoky port in Wales, 

And Gloucester tower bright i' the sun. 

All know that patient wandering one. 

And sometimes when they burn the leaves 

The bonfires' smoking trails and heaves, 

And girt red flames twink and twire 

As though he ploughed the hill afire. 

And in men's hearts in many lands 

A spiritual ploughman stands 

Forever waiting, waiting now. 

The heart's ''Put in, man, zook the plough." 

By this the sun was all one glitter. 
The little birds were all in twitter ; 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 89 

Out of a tuft a little lark 
Went higher up than I could mark, 
His little throat was all one thirst 
To sing until his heart should burst 
To sing aloft in golden Ught 
His song from blue air out of sight. 
The mist drove by, and now the cows 
Came plodding up to milking house. 
Followed by Frank, the Callows' cowman, 
Who whistled "Adam was a ploughman." 
There come such cawing from the rooks, 
Such running chuck from little brooks, 
One thought it March, just budding green, 
With hedgerows full of celandine. 
An otter 'out of stream and played, 
Two hares come loping up and stayed ; 
Wide-eyed and tender-eared but bold. 
Sheep bleated up by Penny's fold. 
I heard a partridge covey call, 
The morning sun was bright on all. 



90 THE EVERLASTING MERCY 

Down the long slope the plough team drove 
The tossing rooks arose and hove. 
A stone struck on the share. A word 
Came to the team. The red earth stirred. 

I crossed the hedge by shooter's gap, 
I hitched my boxer's belt a strap, 
I jumped the ditch and crossed the fallow : 
I took the hales from farmer Callow. 



How swift the summer goes, 
Forget-me-not, pink, rose. 
The young grass when I started 
And now the hay is carted. 
And now my song is ended. 
And all the summer spended ; 
The blackbird's second brood 
Routs beech leaves in the wood ; 
The pink and rose have speeded, 
Forget-me-not has seeded. 



THE EVERLASTING MERCY 91 

Only the winds that blew, 
The rain that makes things new, 
The earth that hides things old, 
And blessings manifold. 

lovely lily clean, 
lily springing green, 
O lily bursting white. 
Dear lily of delight, 
Spring in my heart agen 
That I may flower to men. 

Great Hampden. June, 1911. 



NOTE 

"The Everlasting Mercy" first appeared 
in The English Review for October, 1911. I 
thank the Editor and Proprietors of that 
paper for permitting me to reprint it here. 
The persons and events described in the poem 
are entirely imaginary, and no reference is 
made or intended to any living person. 

John Masefield. 



92 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE 
STREET ' 

PART I 

Down Bye Street, in a little Shropshire town, 
There lived a widow with her only son : 
She had no wealth nor title to renown, 
Nor any joyous hours, never one. 
She rose from ragged mattress before sun 
And stitched all day until her eyes were red, 
And had to stitch, because her man was dead. 

Sometimes she fell asleep, she stitched so hard. 
Letting the linen fall upon the floor ; 
And hungry cats would steal in from the yard. 
And mangy chickens pecked about the door, 

1 Copyright in the United Kingdom and U. S. A., 
1912. 

93 



94 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Craning their necks so ragged and so sore 
To search the room for bread-crumbs, or for 

mouse, 
But they got nothing in the widow's house. 

Mostly she made her bread by hemming 

shrouds 
For one rich undertaker in the High Street, 
Who used to pray that folks might die in 

crowds 
And that their friends might pay to let them 

lie sweet ; 
And when one died the widow in the Bye 

Street 
Stitched night and day to give the worm his 

dole. 
The dead were better dressed than that poor 

soul. 

Her Httle son was all her life's delight, 
For in his little features she could find 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 95 

A glimpse of that dead husband out of sight, 
Where out of sight is never out of mind. 
And so she stitched till she was nearly blind, 
Or till the tallow candle end was done, 
To get a living for her little son. 

Her love for him being such she would not 

rest. 
It was a want which ate her out and in. 
Another hunger in her withered breast 
Pressing her woman's bones against the skin. 
To make him plump she starved her body 

thin. 
And he, he ate the food, and never knew, 
He laughed and played as little children do. 

When there was little sickness in the place 
She took what God would send, and what 

God sent 
Never brought any colour to her face 



96 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Nor life into her footsteps when she went. 
Going, she trembled always withered and 

bent, 
For all went to her son, always the same, 
He was first served whatever blessing came. 

Sometimes she wandered out to gather sticks, 
For it was bitter cold there when it snowed. 
And she stole hay out of the farmer's ricks 
For bands to wrap her feet in while she sewed. 
And when her feet were warm and the grate 

glowed 
She hugged her little son, her heart's desire. 
With ''Jimmy, ain't it snug beside the fire ?" 

So years went on till Jimmy was a lad 
And went to work as poor lads have to do. 
And then the widow's loving heart was glad 
To know that all the pains she had gone 
through, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 97 

And all the years of putting on the screw, 
Down to the sharpest turn a mortal can, 
Had borne their fruit, and made her child a 
man. 

He got a job at working on the line, 
Tipping the earth down, trolly after truck, 
From daylight till the evening, wet or fine. 
With arms all red from wallowing in the muck, 
And spitting, as the trolly tipped, for luck. 
And singing ''Binger" as he swung the pick, 
Because the red blood ran in him so quick. 

So there was bacon then, at night, for supper 
In Bye Street there, where he and mother 

stay; 
And boots they had, not leaky in the upper. 
And room rent ready on the settling day ; 
And beer for poor old mother, worn and grey, 
And fire in frost ; and in the widow's eyes 
It seemed the Lord had made earth paradise. 



98 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

And there they sat of evenings after dark 
Singing their song of '^Binger/' he and she, 
Her poor old cackle made the mongrels bark 
And "You sing Binger, mother," carols he; 
"By crimes, but that's a good song, that her 

be:" 
And then they slept there in the room they 

shared, 
And all the time fate had his end prepared. 

One thing alone made Ufe not perfect sweet : 
The mother's daily fear of what would come 
When woman and her lovely boy should 

meet, 
When the new wife would break up the old 

home. 
Fear of that unborn evil struck her dumb, 
And when her darling and a woman met. 
She shook and prayed, " Not her, God ; not 

yet." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 99 

''Not yet, dear God, my Jimmy took from 

me." 
Then she would subtly question with her son. 
"Not very handsome, I don't think her be?" 
*' God help the man who marries such an one." 
Her red eyes peered to spy the mischief done. 
She took great care to keep the girls away, 
And all her trouble made him easier prey. 

There was a woman out at Plaister's End, 
Light of her body, fifty to the pound, 
A copper coin for any man to spend, 
Lovely to look on when the wits were 

drowned. 
Her husband's skeleton was never found, 
It lay among the rocks at Glydjr Mor 
Where he drank poison finding her a whore. 

She was not native there, for she belonged 
Out Milford way, or Swansea ; no one knew. 



100 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She had the piteous look of someone wronged, 
"Anna," her name, a widow, last of Triw. 
She had lived at Plaister's End a year or two ; 
At Callow's cottage, renting half an acre ; 
She was a hen-wife and a perfume-maker. 

Secret she was ; she lived in reputation ; 
But secret unseen threads went floating out : 
Her smile, her voice, her face, were all temp- 
tation. 
All subtle flies to trouble man the trout ; 
Man to entice, entrap, entangle, flout . . . 
To take and spoil, and then to cast aside : 
Gain without giving was the craft she pHed. 

And she complained, poor lonely widowed 

soul. 
How no one cared, and men were rutters all ; 
While true love is an ever burning goal 
Burning the brighter as the shadows fall. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 101 

And all love's dogs went hunting at the call, 
Married or not she took them by the brain, 
Sucked at their hearts and tossed them back 
again. 

Like the straw fires lit on Saint John's Eve, 
She burned and dwindled in her fickle heart ; 
For if she wept when Harry took his leave, 
Her tears were lures to beckon Bob to start. 
And if, while loving Bob, a tinker's cart 
Came by, she opened window with a smile 
And gave the tinker hints to wait a while. 

She passed for pure; but, years before, in 

Wales, 
Living at Mountain Ash with different men. 
Her less discretion had inspired tales 
Of certain things she did, and how, and when. 
Those seven years of youth ; we are frantic 

then. 



102 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She had been frantic in her years of youth, 
The tales were not more evil than the truth. 

She had two children as the fruits of trade, 
Though she drank bitter herbs to kill the 

curse, 
Both of them sons, and one she overlaid, 
The other one the parish had to nurse. 
Now she grew plump with money in her purse, 
Passing for pure a hundred miles, I guess. 
From where her little son wore workhouse 

dress. 

There with the Union boys he came and went, 
A parish bastard fed on bread and tea, 
Wearing a bright tin badge in furthest Gwent, 
And no one knowing who his folk could be. 
His mother never knew his new name : she, — 
She touched the lust of those who served her 

turn, 
And chief among her men was Shepherd Ern. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 103 

A moody, treacherous man of bawdy mind, 
Married to that mild girl from Ercall Hill, 
Whose gentle goodness made him more in- 
clined 
To hotter sauces sharper on the bill. 
The new lust gives the lecher the new thrill. 
The new wine scratches as it slips the throat. 
The new flag is so bright by the old boat. 

Ern was her man to buy her bread and meat. 
Half of his weekly wage was hers to spend. 
She used to mock, ''How is your wife, my 

sweet?" 
Or wail, "0, Ernie, how is this to end?" 
Or coo, "My Ernie is without a friend. 
She cannot understand my precious life," 
And Ernie would go home and beat his wife. 

So the four souls are ranged, the chess-board 
set. 



104 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

The dark, invisible hand of secret Fate 
Brought it to come to being that they met 
After so many years of lying in wait. 
While we least think it he prepares his Mate. 
Mate, and the King's pawn played, it never 

ceases 
Though all the earth is dust of taken pieces. 

PART II 

October Fair-time is the time for fun, 
For all the street is hurdled into rows 
Of pens of heifers blinking at the sun, 
And Lemster sheep which pant and seem to 

doze, 
And stalls of hardbake and galanty shows. 
And cheap jacks smashing crocks, and trum- 
pets blowing, 
And the loud organ of the horses going. 

There you can buy blue ribbons for your girl 
Or take her in a swing-boat tossing high. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 105 

Or hold her fast when all the horses whirl 
Round to the steam pipe whanging at the sky, 
Or stand her cockshies at the cocoa-shy, 
Or buy her brooches with her name in red, 
Or Queen Victoria done in gingerbread. 

Then there are rifle shots at tossing balls, 

"And if you hit you get a good cigar," 

And strength- whackers for lads to lamm with 

mauls, 
And Cheshire cheeses on a greasy spar. 
The country folk flock in from near and far, 
Women and men, like blowflies to the roast, 
All love the fair ; but Anna loved it most. 

Anna was all agog to see the fair ; 
She made Ern promise to be there to meet her. 
To arm her round to all the pleasures there. 
And buy her ribbons for her neck, and treat 

her. 
So that no woman at the fair should beat her 



106 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

In having pleasure at a man's expense. 

She planned to meet him at the chapel fence. 

So Ernie went ; and Jimmy took his mother, 
Dressed in her finest with a Monmouth shawl, 
And there was such a crowd she thought she'd 

smother. 
And 0, she loved a pep'mint above all. 
Clash go the crockeries where the cheapjacks 

bawl, 
Baa go the sheep, thud goes the waxwork's 

drum, 
And Ernie cursed for Anna hadn't come. 

He hunted for her up and down the place, 
Raging and snapping like a working brew. 
''If you're with someone else I'll smash his face, 
And when I've done for him I'll go for you." 
He bought no fairings as he'd vowed to do 
For his poor little children back at home 
Stuck at the glass 'Ho see till father come." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 107 

Not finding her, he went into an inn, 
Busy with ringing till and scratching matches. 
Where thirsty drovers mingled stout with gin 
And three or four Welsh herds were singing 

catches. 
The swing-doors clattered, letting in in 

snatches 
The noises of the fair, now low, now loud. 
Ern called for beer and glowered at the crowd. 

While he was glowering at his drinking there, 
In came the gipsy Bessie, hawking toys ; 
A bold-eyed strapping harlot with black hair, 
One of the tribe which camped at Shepherd's 

Bois. 
She lured him out of inn into the noise 
Of the steam-organ where the horses spun, 
And so the end of all things was begun. 

Newness in lust, always the old in love. 

' ' Put up your toys, ' ' he said, ' ' and come along, 



108 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

We'll have a turn of swing boats up above, 
And see the murder when they strike the 

gong." 
"Don't 'ee," she giggled. '^My, but ain't 

you strong. 
And where's your proper girl? You don't 

know me." 
'ado." ''You don't." "Why, then, I will," 

said he. 

Anna was late because the cart which drove 

her 
Called for her late (the horse had broke a 

trace). 
She was all dressed and scented for her lover, 
Her bright blue blouse had imitation lace. 
The paint was red as roses on her face. 
She hummed a song, because she thought to 

see 
How envious all the other girls would be. : 



THE WIBOW IN THE BYE STREET 109 

When she arrived and found her Ernie gone, 
Her bitter heart thought, ''This is how it is. 
Keeping me waiting while the sports are on : 
Promising faithful, too, and then to miss. 
O, Ernie, won't I give it you for this." 
And looking up she saw a couple cling, 
Ern with his arm round Bessie in the swing. 

Ern caught her eye and spat, and cut her dead, 
Bessie laughed hardly, in the gipsy way. 
Anna, though blind with fury, tossed her head, 
Biting her lips until the red was grey, 
For bitter moments given, bitter pay, 
The time for payment comes, early or late, 
No earthly debtor but accounts to Fate. 

She turned aside, telling with bitter oaths 
What Ern should suffer if he turned agen, 
And there was Jimmy stripping off his clothes 
Within a little ring of farming men. 



110 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''Now, Jimmy, put the old tup into pen." 
His mother, watching, thought her heart 

would curdle. 
To see Jim drag the old ram to the hurdle. 

Then the ram butted and the game began, 
Till Jimmy's muscles cracked and the ram 

grunted. 
The good old wrestHng game of Ram and 

Man, 
At which none knows the hunter from the 

hunted. 
"Come and see Jimmy have his belly 

bunted." 
"Good tup. Good Jim. Good Jimmy. 

Sick him. Rover, 
By dang, but Jimmy's got him fairly over." 

Then there was clap of hands and Jimmy 

grinned 
And took five silver shiUings from his backers, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 111 

And said th' old tup had put him out of wind 
Or else he'd take all comers at the Whackers. 
And some made rude remarks of rams and 

knackers, 
And mother shook to get her son alone, 
So's to be sure he hadn't broke a bone. 

None but the lucky man deserves the fair, 
For lucky men have money and success, 
Things that a whore is very glad to share, 
Or dip, at least, a finger in the mess. 
Anne, with her raddled cheeks and Sunday 

dress. 
Smiled upon Jimmy, seeing him succeed. 
As though to say, ''You are a man, indeed." 

All the great things of life are swiftly done. 
Creation, death, and love the double gate. 
However much we dawdle in the sun 
We have to hurry at the touch of Fate ; 



112 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

When Life knocks at the door no one can 

wait, 
When Death makes his arrest we have to go. 
And so with Love, and Jimmy found it so. 

Love, the sharp spear, went pricking to the 

bone. 
In that one look, desire and bitter aching, 
Longing to have that woman all alone 
For her dear beauty's sake all else forsaking ; 
And sudden agony that set him shaking 
Lest she, whose beauty made his heart's 

blood cruddle. 
Should be another man's to kiss and cuddle. 

She was beside him when he left the ring. 
Her soft dress brushed against him as he 

passed her ; 
He thought her penny scent a sweeter thing 
Than precious ointment out of alabaster ; 



TEE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 113 

Love, the mild servant, makes a drunken 

master. 
She smiled, half sadly, out of thoughtful eyes. 
And all the strong young man was easy prize. 

She spoke, to take him, seeing him a sheep, 
''How beautiful you wrastled with the ram, 
It made me all go tremble just to peep, 
I am that fond of wrastling, that I am. 
Why, here's your mother, too. Good even- 
ing, ma'am. 
I was just telling Jim how well he done. 
How proud you must be of so fine a son." 

Old mother blinked, while Jimmy hardly 

knew 
Whether he knew the woman there or not ; 
But well he knew, if not, he wanted to, 
Joy of her beauty ran in him so hot. 
Old trembling mother by him was forgot, 



114 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

While Anna searched the mother's face, to 

know 
Whether she took her for a whore or no. 

The woman's maxim, ''Win the woman first," 
Made her be gracious to the withered thing. 
"This being in crowds do give one such a 

thirst, 
I wonder if they've tea going at 'The King' ? 
My throat's that dry my very tongue do cHng, 
Perhaps you'd take my arm, we'd wander up 
(If you'd agree) and try and get a cup. 

Come, ma'am, a cup of tea would do you 

good 
There's nothing like a nice hot cup of tea 
After the crowd and all the time you've stood; 
And 'The King's' strict, it isn't like 'The 

Key.' 
Now, take my arm, my dear, and lean on 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 115 

And Jimmy's mother, being nearly blind, 
Took Anna's arm, and only thought her kind. 

So off they set, with Anna talking to her, 
How nice the tea would be after the crowd, 
And mother thinking half the time she knew 

her, 
And Jimmy's heart's blood ticking quick and 

loud. 
And Death beside him knitting at his shroud. 
And all the High Street babbling with the fair. 
And white October clouds in the blue air. 

So tea was made, and down they sat to drink ; 
the pale beauty sitting at the board 
There is more death in women than we think. 
There is much danger in the soul adored, 
The white hands bring the poison and the 

cord; 
Death has a lodge in lips as red as cherries, 
Death has a mansion in the yew tree berries. 



116 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

They sat there talking after tea was done, 
And Jimmy blushed at Anna's sparkling looks, 
And Anna flattered mother on her son, 
Catching both fishes on her subtle hooks. 
With twilight, tea and talk in ingle-nooks. 
And music coming up from the dim street. 
Mother had never known a fair so sweet. 

Now cow-bells clink, for milking-time is come, 
The drovers stack the hurdles into carts. 
New masters drive the straying cattle home, 
Many a young calf from his mother parts. 
Hogs straggle back to sty by fits and starts ; 
The farmers take a last glass at the inns. 
And now the frolic of the fair begins. 

All of the side shows of the fair are lighted. 
Flares and bright lights, and brassy cymbals 

clanging, 
''Beginning now" and ''Everyone's invited," 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 117 

Shatter the pauses of the organ's whanging, 
The Oldest Show on Earth and the Last 

Hanging, 
"The Murder in the Red Barn," with real 

blood, 
The rifles crack, the Sally shy-sticks thud. 

Anna walked slowly homewards with her 

prey, 
Holding old tottering mother's weight upon 

her. 
And pouring in sweet poison on the way 
Of ''Such a pleasure, ma'am, and such an 

honour," 
And ''One's so safe with such a son to con her 
Through all the noises and through all the 

press. 
Boys daredn't squirt tormenters on her dress." 

At mother's door they stop to say "Good- 
night." 



118 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

And mother must go in to set the table. 
Anna pretended that she felt a fright 
To go alone through all the merry babel : 
"My friends are waiting at 'The Cain and 

Abel/ 
Just down the other side of Market Square, 
It'd be a mercy if you'd set me there." 

So Jimmy came, while mother went inside ; 
Anna has got her victim in her clutch. 
Jimmy, all blushing, glad to be her guide. 
Thrilled by her scent, and trembling at her 

touch. 
She was all white and dark, and said not much ; 
She sighed, to hint that pleasure's grave was 

dug, 
And smiled within to see him such a mug. 

They passed the doctor's house among the 

trees. 
She sighed so deep that Jimmy asked her why. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 119 

"I'm too unhappy upon nights like these, 
When evoryone has happiness but I !" 
''Then, aren't you happy?" She appeared 

to cry, 
BUnked with her eyes, and turned away her 

head: 
"Not much; but some men understand," 

she said. 

Her voice caught hghtly on a broken note, 
Jimmy half-dared but dared not touch her 

hand. 
Yet all his blood went pumping in his throat 
Beside the beauty he could understand, 
And Death stopped knitting at the muffling 

band. 
"The shroud is done," he muttered, "toe to 

chin." 
He snapped the ends, and tucked his needles 

in. 



120 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Jimmy, half stammering, choked, ''Has any 



man 

He stopped, she shook her head to answer 

''No." 
"Then tell me." "No. P'raps some day, 

if I can. 
It hurts to talk of some things ever so. 
But you're so different. There, come, we 

must go. 
None but unhappy women know how good 
It is to meet a soul who's understood." 
" No. Wait a moment. May I call you 

Anna?" 

"Perhaps. There must be nearness 'twixt 

us two." 
Love in her face hung out his bloody banner, 
And all love's clanging trumpets shocked and 

blew 
"When we got up to-day we never knew." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 121 

''I'm sure I didn't think, nor you did." 
''Never." 

"And now this friendship's come to us for- 
ever." 

"Now, Anna, take my arm, dear." "Not 

to-night. 
That must come later when we know our 

minds. 
We must agree to keep this evening white. 
We'll eat the fruit to-night and save the 

rinds." 
And all the folk whose shadows darked the 

blinds. 
And all the dancers whirling in the fair, 
Were wretched worms to Jim and Anna 

there. 

"How wonderful life is," said Anna, lowly. 
"But it begins again with you for friend." 



122 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

In the dim lamplight Jimmy thought her holy, 
A lovely fragile thing for him to tend, 
Grace beyond measure, beauty without end. 
''Anna," he said; "Good-night. This is the 

door. 
I never knew what people meant before." 

" Good-night, my friend. Good-bye." "But 
oh, my sweet. 

The night's quite early yet, don't say good- 
bye, 

Come just another short turn down the street, 

The whole life's bubbling up for you and I. 

Somehow I feel to-morrow we may die. 

Come just as far as to the blacksmith's Hght." 

But "No," said Anna ; "not to-night. Good- 
night." 

All the tides triumph when the white moon 
fills. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 123 

Down in the race the toppHng waters shout, 
The breakers shake the bases of the hills, 
There is a thundering where the streams go 

out, 
And the wise shipman puts his ship about 
Seeing the gathering of those waters wan, 
But what when love makes high tide in a 

man? 

Jimmy walked home with all his mind on 

fire, 
One lovely face forever set in flame. 
He shivered as he went, like tautened wire. 
Surge after surge of shuddering in him came 
And then swept out repeating one sweet name 
"Anna, oh Anna," to the evening star. 
Anna was sipping whiskey in the bar. 

So back to home and mother Jimmy wan- 
dered, 



124 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Thinking of Plaister's End and Anna's lips. 
He ate no supper worth the name, but pon- 
dered 
On Plaister's End hedge, scarlet with ripe hips, 
And of the lovely moon there in eclipse, 
And how she must be shining in the house 
Behind the hedge of those old dog-rose boughs. 

Old mother cleared away. The clock struck 

eight. 
''Why, boy, you've left your bacon, lawks a 

me, 
So that's what comes of having tea so late, 
Another time you'll go withoai your tea. 
Your father liked his cup, too, didn't he. 
Always ' another cup ' he used to say, 
He never went without on any day. 

How nice the lady was and how she talked, 
I've never had a nicer fair, not ever." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 125 

"She said she'd like to see us if we walked 
To Plaister's End, beyond by Watersever. 
Nice-looking woman, too, and that, and 

clever ; 
We might go round one evening, p'raps, we 

two; 
Or I might go, if it's too far for you." 

''No," said the mother, "we're not folk for 

that; 
Meet at the fair and that, and there an end. 
Rake out the fire and put out the cat, 
These fairs are sinful, tempting folk to spend. 
Of course she spoke polite and like a friend ; 
Of course she had to do, and so I let her, 
But now it's done and past, so I forget her." 

"I don't see why forget her. Why forget 

her? 
She treat us kind. She weren't like everyone. 



126 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

I never saw a woman I liked better, 

And he's not easy pleased, my father's son. 

So I'll go round some night when work is 

done." 
''Now, Jim, my dear, trust mother, there's 

a dear." 
"Well, so I do, but sometimes you're so 

queer." 

She blinked at him out of her withered eyes 
Below her lashless eyelids red and bleared. 
Her months of sacrifice had won the prize, 
Her Jim had come to what she always feared. 
And yet she doubted, so she shook and peered 
And begged her God not let a woman take 
The lovely son whom she had starved to 
make. 

Doubting, she stood the dishes in the rack, 
''We'll ask her in some evening, then," she 
said, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 127 

''How nice her hair looked in the bit of 

black." 
And still she peered from eyes all dim and 

red 
To note at once if Jimmy drooped his head, 
Or if his ears blushed when he heard her 

praised, 
And Jimmy blushed and hung his head and 



"This is the end," she thought. "This is 

the end. 
I'll have to sew again for Mr. Jones, 
Do hems when I can hardly see to mend. 
And have the old ache in my marrow bones. 
And when his wife's in child-bed, when she 

groans, 
She'll send for me until the pains have 

ceased. 
And give me leavings at the christening feast. 



128 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

And sit aslant to eye me as I eat, 
'You're only wanted here, ma'am, for to-day, 
Just for the christ'ning party, for the treat. 
Don't ever think I mean to let you stay ; 
Two's company, three's none, that's what I 

say.' 
Life can be bitter to the very bone 
When one is poor, and woman, and alone." 

''Jimmy," she said, still doubting. "Come, 

my dear. 
Let's have our 'Binger,' 'fore we go to bed." 
And then "The parson's dog," she cackled 

clear, 
"Lep over stile," she sang, nodding her head. 
"His name was little Binger." "Jim," she 

said, 
"Binger, now, chorus" . . . Jimmy kicked 

the hob. 
The sacrament of song died in a sob. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 129 

Jimmy went out into the night to think 
Under the moon so steady in the blue. 
The woman's beauty ran in him hke drink, 
The fear that men had loved her burnt him 

through ; 
The fear that even then another knew 
All the deep mystery which women make 
To hide the inner nothing made him shake. 

''Anna, I love you, and I always shall." 
He looked towards Plaister's End beyond 

Cot Hills. 
A white star glimmered in the long canal, 
A droning from the music came in thrills. 
Love is a flame to burn out human wills. 
Love is a flame to set the will on fire. 
Love is a flame to cheat men into mire, 

One of the three, we make Love what we 
choose. 



130 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

But Jimmy did not know, he only thought 
That Anna was too beautiful to lose, 
That she was all the world and he was naught, 
That it was sweet, though bitter, to be caught. 
''Anna, I love you." Underneath the moon, 
''I shall go mad unless I see you soon." 

The fair's lights threw aloft a misty glow. 
The organ whangs, the giddy horses reel, 
The rifles ce?.se, the folk begin to go, 
The hands unclamp the swing boats from the 

wheel. 
There is a smell of trodden orange peel ; 
The organ drones and dies, the horses stop, 
And then the tent collapses from the top. 

The fair is over, let the people troop. 

The drunkards stagger homewards down the 

gutters, 
The showmen heave in an excited group. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 131 

The poles tilt slowly down, the canvas flutters, 
The mauls knock out the pins, the last flare 

sputters. 
"Lower away." "Go easy." "Lower, 

lower." 
"You've dang near knock my skull in. Loose 

it slower." 

* ' Back in the horses. " " Are the swing boats 

loaded?" 
"All right to start." "Bill, where's the 

cushion gone ? 
The red one for the Queen?" "I think I 

stowed it." 
"You think, you think. Lord, where's that 

cushion, John?" 
"It's in that ditty box you're sitting on. 
What more d'you want?" A concertina 

plays 
Far off as wandering lovers go their ways. 



132 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Up the dim Bye Street to the market-place 
The dead bones of the fair are borne in carts, 
Horses and swing boats at a funeral pace 
After triumphant hours quickening hearts ; 
A policeman eyes each waggon as it starts, 
The drowsy showmen stumble half asleep, 
One of them catcalls, having drunken deep. 

So out, over the pass, into the plain. 

And the dawn finds them filling empty cans 

In some sweet-smelling dusty country lane. 

Where a brook chatters over rusty pans. 

The iron chimneys of the caravans 

Smoke as they go. And now the fair has 

gone 
To find a new pitch somewhere further on. 

But as the fair moved out two lovers came, 
Ernie and Bessie loitering out together ; 
Bessie with wild eyes, hungry as a flame, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 133 

Ern like a stallion tugging at a tether. 
It was calm moonlight, and October weather, 
So still, so lovely, as they topped the ridge. 
They brushed by Jimmy standing on the 
bridge. 

And, as they passed, they gravely eyed each 
other. 

And the blood burned in each heart beating 
there; ' ■ 

And out into the Bye Street tottered mother, 

Without her shawl, in the October air. 

"Jimmy," she cried, ''Jimmy." And Bes- 
sie's hair 

Drooped on the instant over Ernie's face, 

And the two lovers clung in an embrace. 

''0, Ern." ''My own, my Bessie." As they 

kissed 
Jimmy was envious of the thing unknown. 



134 THE WIDOW IN THE BTE STREET 

So this was Love, the something he had 

missed, 
Woman and man athirst, aflame, alone. 
Envy went knocking at his marrow-bone. 
And Anna's face swam up so dim, so fair, 
Shining and sweet, with poppies in her hair. 

PART III 

After the fair, the gang began again. 
Tipping the trolleys down the banks of earth. 
The truck of stone clanks on the endless 

chain, 
A clever pony guides it to its berth. 
"Let go." It tips, the navvies shout for 

mirth 
To see the pony step aside, so wise. 
But Jimmy sighed, thinking of Anna's eyes. 

And when he stopped his shovelling he looked 
Over the junipers towards Plaister way, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 135 

The beauty of his darUng had him hooked, 
He had no heart for wrasthng with the clay. 
"O Lord Almighty, I must get away; 
O Lord, I must. I must just see my flower. 
Why, I could run there in the dinner hour." 

The whistle on the pilot engine blew. 

The men knocked off, and Jimmy shpped 

aside 
Over the fence, over the bridge, and through, 
And then ahead along the water-side. 
Under the red-brick rail-bridge, arching wide. 
Over the hedge, across the fields, and on ; 
The foreman asked: ''Where's Jimmy Gur- 

ney gone?" 

It is a mile and more to Plaister's End, 
But Jimmy ran the short way by the stream, 
And there was Anna's cottage at the bend. 
With blue smoke on the chimney, faint as 
steam. 



136 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

"God, she's at home," and up his heart a 

gleam 
Leapt hke a rocket on November nights, 
And shattered slowly in a burst of lights. 

Anna was singing at her kitchen fire. 
She was surprised, and not well pleased to see 
A sweating navvy, red with heat and mire, 
Come to her door, whoever he might be. 
But when she saw that it was Jimmy, she 
Smiled at his eyes upon her, full of pain, 
And thought, ''But, still, he mustn't come 
again. 

People will talk ; boys are such crazy things ; 
But he's a dear boy though he is so green." 
So, hurriedly, she slipped her apron strings. 
And dabbed her hair, and wiped her fingers 

clean, 
And came to greet him languid as a queen, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 137 

Looking as sweet, as fair, as pure, as sad. 
As when she drove her loving husband mad. 

"Poor boy," she said, ''Poor boy, how hot 
you are." 

She laid a cool hand to his sweating face. 

''How kind to come. Have you been run- 
ning far ? 

Fm just going out ; come up the road a pace. 

dear, these hens; they're all about the 

place." 
So Jimmy shooed the hens at her command, 
And got outside the gate as she had planned. 

"Anna, my dear, I love you ; love you, true ; 

1 had to come — I don't know — I can't rest — 
I lay awake all night, thinking of you. 
Many must love you, but I love you best." 
"Many have loved me, yes, dear," she con- 
fessed, 



138 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She smiled upon him with a tender pride, 
"But my love ended when my husband died. 

"Still, we'll be friends, dear friends, dear, ten- 
der friends ; 
Love with its fever's at an end for me. 
Be by me gently now the fever ends. 
Life is a lovelier thing than lovers see, 
I'd like to trust a man, Jimmy," said she, 
"May I trust you?" "Oh, Anna dear, my 

dear " 

"Don't come so close," she said, "with people 
near. 

Dear, don't be vexed ; it's very sweet to find 
One who will understand ; but Hfe is Hfe, 
And those who do not know are so unkind. 
But you'll be by me, Jimmy, in the strife, 
I love you though I cannot be your wife ; 
And now be off, before the whistle goes, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 139 

Or else you'll lose your quarter, goodness 
knows." 

"When can I see you, Anna ? Tell me, dear. 

To-night? To-morrow? Shall I come to- 
night?" 

''Jimmy, my friend, I cannot have you here ; 

But when I come to town perhaps we might. 

Dear, you must go ; no kissing ; you can 
write, 

And I'll arrange a meeting when I learn 

What friends are doing" (meaning Shepherd 
Ern). 

"Good-bye, my own." "Dear Jim, you 

understand. 
If we were only free, dear, free to meet, 
Dear, I would take you by your big, strong 

hand 
And kiss your dear boy eyes so blue and 

sweet; 



140 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

But my dead husband lies under the sheet, 
Dead in my heart, dear, lovely, lonely one, 
So, Jim, my dear, my loving days are done. 

But though my heart is buried in his grave 
Something might be — friendship and utter 

trust — 
And you, my dear starved little Jim shall 

have 
Flowers of friendship from my dead heart's 

dust; 
Life would be sweet if men would never lust. 
Why do you, Jimmy? Tell me sometime, 

dear. 
Why men are always what we women fear. 

Not now. Good-bye; we understand, we 

two, 
And life, oh, Jim, how glorious life is ; 
This sunshine in my heart is due to you ; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 141 

I was so sad, and life has given this. 
I think 'I wish I had something of his,' 
Do give me something, will you be so kind ? 
Something to keep you always in my mind." 

''I will," he said. ''Now go, or you'll be 

late." 
He broke from her and ran, and never dreamt 
That as she stood to watch him from the gate 
Her heart was half amusement, half contempt, 
Comparing Jim the squab, red and unkempt, 
In sweaty corduroys, with Shepherd Ern. 
She blew him kisses till he passed the turn. 

The whistle blew before he reached the Hne ; 
The foreman asked him what the hell he 

meant. 
Whether a duke had asked him out to dine, 
Or if he thought the bag would pay his rent ? 
And Jim was fined before the foreman went. 



142 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

But still his spirit glowed from Anna's words, 
Cooed in the voice so like a singing bird's. 

"0 Anna, darling, you shall have a present ; 
I'd give you golden gems if I were rich, 
And everything that's sweet and all that's 

pleasant." 
He dropped his pick as though he had a stitch. 
And stared tow'rds Plaister's End, past 

Bushe's Pitch. 
beauty, what I have to give I'll give. 
All mine is yours, beloved, while I hve." 

All through the afternoon his pick was slack- 
ing. 

His eyes were always turning west and south. 

The foreman was inclined to send him pack- 
ing, 

But put it down to after fair-day drouth ; 

He looked at Jimmy with an ugly mouth. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 143 

And Jimmy slacked, and muttered in a moan, 
''My love, my beautiful, my very own." 

So she had loved. Another man had had 

her; 
She had been his with passion in the night ; 
An agony of envy made him sadder, 
Yet stabbed a pang of bitter-sweet delight — 
O he would keep his image of her white. 
The foreman cursed, stepped up, and asked 

him fiat 
What kind of gum tree he was gaping at. 

It was Jim's custom, when the pay day came, 
To take his weekly five and twenty shilling 
Back in the little packet to his dame ; 
Not taking out a farthing for a filling. 
Nor twopence for a pot, for he was willing 
That she should have it all to save or spend. 
But love makes many lovely customs end. 



144 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Next pay day came, and Jimmy took the 

moDey, 
But not to mother, for he meant to buy 
A thirteen shiUing locket for his honey. 
Whatever beUies hungered and went dry, 
A silver heart-shape with a ruby eye. 
He bought the thing and paid the shopman's 

price. 
And hurried off to make the sacrifice. 

'^ Is it for me ? You dear, dear generous boy. 
How sweet of you. I'll wear it in my dress. 
When you're beside me life is such a joy, 
You bring the sun to solitariness." 
She brushed his jacket with a light caress. 
His arms went round her fast, she yielded 

meek; 
He had the happiness to kiss her cheek. 

''My dear, my dear." "My very dear, my 
Jim, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 145 

How very kind my Jimmy is to me ; 
I ache to think that some are harsh to him ; 
Not hke my Jimmy, beautiful and free. 
My darling boy, how lovely it would be 
If all would trust as we two trust each other." 
And Jimmy's heart grew hard against his 
mother. 

She, poor old soul, was waiting in the gloom 

For Jimmy's pay, that she could do the shop- 
ping. 

The clock ticked out a solemn tale of doom ; 

Clogs on the bricks outside went clippa- 
clopping, 

The owls were coming out and dew was drop- 
ping. 

The bacon burnt, and Jimmy not yet home. 

The clock was ticking dooms out like a gnome. 

" What can have kept him that he doesn't 
come ? 



146 THE WIDOW IN TEE BYE STREET 

God, they'd tell me if he'd come to hurt." 
The unknown, unseen evil struck her numb, 
She saw his body bloody in the dirt, 
She saw the life blood pumping through the 

shirt, 
She saw him tipsy in the navvies' booth, 
She saw all forms of evil but the truth. 

At last she hurried up the line to ask 

If Jim were hurt or why he wasn't back. 

She found the watchman wearing through 

his task ; 
Over the fire basket in his shack ; 
Behind, the new embankment rose up black. 
''Gurney?" he said. ''He'd got to see a 

friend." 
"Where?" ''I dunno. I think out Plais- 

ter's End." 

Thanking the man, she tottered down the hill, 
The long-feared fang had bitten to the bone. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 147 

The brook beside her talked as water will 
That it was lonely singing all alone, 
The night was lonely with the water's tone, 
And she was lonely to the very marrow. 
Love puts such bitter poison on Fate's arrow. 

She went the long way to them by the mills, 
She told herself that she must find her son. 
The night was ominous of many ills ; 
The soughing larch-clump almost made her 

run, 
Her boots hurt (she had got a stone in one) 
And bitter beaks were tearing at her liver 
That her boy's heart was turned from her 

forever. 

She kept the lane, past Spindle's, past the 

Callows', 
Her lips still muttering prayers against the 

worst. 



148 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

And there were people coming from the sal- 
lows, 
Along the wild duck patch by Beggar's Hurst. 
Being in moonlight mother saw them first, 
She saw them moving in the moonlight dim, 
A woman with a sweet voice saying ''Jim." 

Trembling she grovelled down into the ditch, 
They wandered past her pressing side to side. 
''O Anna, my belov'd, if I were rich." 
It was her son, and Anna's voice replied, 
''Dear boy, dear beauty boy, my love and 

pride." 
And he : "It's but a silver thing, but I 
Will earn you better lockets by and bye." 

"Dear boy, you mustn't." "But I mean to 

do." 
"What was that funny sort of noise I 

heard?" 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 149 

''Where?" 

''In the hedge ; a sort of sob or coo. 

Listen. It's gone." "It may have been a 

bird." 
Jim tossed a stone but mother never stirred. 
She hugged the hedgerow, choking down her 

pain, 
While the hot tears were bhnding in her brain. 

The two passed on, the withered woman rose. 
For many minutes she could only shake, 
Staring ahead with trembling little "Oh's," 
The noise a very frightened child might make. 
"0 God, dear God, don't let the woman take 
My little son, God, not my little Jim. 
O God, I'll have to starve if I lose him." 

So back she trembled, nodding with her head. 
Laughing and trembling in the bursts of tears. 
Her ditch-filled boots both squelching in the 
tread, 



150 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Her shopping-bonnet sagging to her ears, 
Her heart too dumb with brokenness for fears. 
The nightmare whickering with the laugh of 

death 
Could not have added terror to her breath. 

She reached the house, and : "I'm all right," 

said she, 
"I'll just take off my things ; but I'm all right, 
I'd be all right with just a cup of tea, 
If I could only get this grate to light. 
The paper's damp and Jimmy's late to-night ; 
'Belov'd, if I was rich,' was what he said. 
Oh, Jim, I wish that God would kill me dead." 

While she was blinking at the unUt grate, 
Scratching the moistened match-heads off 

the wood. 
She heard Jim coming, so she reached his 

plate, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 151 

And forked the over-frizzled scraps of food. 
"You're late," she said, ''and this yer isn't 

good, 
Whatever makes you come in late Hke this ?" 
"I've been to Plaister's End, that's how it is." 

M. You've been to Plaister's End ?" 
J. "Yes." 

M. I've been staying 
For money for the shopping ever so. 
Down here we can't get victuals without 

paying, 
There's no trust down the Bye Street, as you 

know. 
And now it's dark and it's too late to go. 
You've been to Plaister's End. What took 
you there?" 
J. "The lady who was with us at the fair." 

M. "The lady, eh ? The lady ? " 
J. "Yes, the lady." 



152 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

M. ''You've been to see her ?" 
J. "Yes." 

M. "What happened then?" 

J. "I saw her." 

M. "Yes. And what filth did she trade 
ye? 
Or d'you expect your locket back agen ? 
I know the rotten ways of whores with men. 
What did it cost ye?" 

J. "What did what cost?" 

M. "It." 
Your devil's penny for the devil's bit." 

J. "I don't know what you mean." 

M. " Jimmy, my own. 
Don't lie to mother, boy, for mother knows. 
I know you and that lady to the bone, 
And she's a whore, that thing you call a rose, 
A whore who takes whatever male thing goes ; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 153 

A harlot with the devil's skill to tell 

The special key of each man's door to hell." 

J. ''She's not. She's nothing of the kind, 

I tell 'ee." 
M. "You can't tell women like a woman 
can; 
A beggar tells a lie to fill his belly, 
A strumpet tells a lie to win a man, 
Women were liars since the world began ; 
And she's a liar, branded in the eyes, 
A rotten har, who inspires lies." 

J. ''I say she's not." 

M. "No, don't 'ee, Jim, my dearie. 

You've seen her often in the last few days. 
She's given a love as makes you come in 

weary 
To lie to me before going out to laze. 
She's tempted you into the devil's ways. 



154 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She's robbing you, full fist, of what you earn, 
In God's Name, what's she giving in return ? " 

J. "Her faith, my dear, and that's enough 

for me." 
M. "Her faith. Her faith. Oh, Jimmy, 
listen, dear ; 
Love doesn't ask for faith, my son, not he ; 
He asks for life throughout the Uve-long year, 
And life's a test for any plough to ere. 
Life tests a plough in meadows made of 

stones, 
Love takes a toll of spirit, mind and bones. 

I know a woman's portion when she loves. 
It's hers to give, my darling, not to take ; 
It isn't lockets, dear, nor pairs of gloves, 
It isn't marriage bells nor wedding cake. 
It's up and cook, although the belly ache ; 
And bear the child, and up and work again, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 155 

And count a sick man's grumble worth the 
pain. 

Will she do this, and fifty times as much?" 

/. ''No. I don't ask her." 

M. ''No. I warrant, no. 
She's one to get a young fool in her clutch. 
And you're a fool to let her trap you so. 
She love you ? She ? O Jimmy, let her go ; 
I was so happy, dear, before she came, 
And now I'm going to the grave in shame. 

I bore you, Jimmy, in this very room. 
For fifteen years I got you all you had, 
You were my little son, made in my womb, 
Left all to me, for God had took your dad, 
You were a good son, doing all I bade, 
Until this strumpet came from God knows 

where, 
And now you lie, and I am in despair. 



156 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Jimmy, I won't say more. I know you think 
That I don't know, being just a withered old, 
With chaps all fallen in and eyes that blink, 
And hands that tremble so they cannot hold. 
A bag of bones to put in churchyard mould, 
A red-eyed hag beside your evening star." 
And Jimmy gulped, and thought, ''By God, 
you are." 

''Well, if I am, my dear, I don't pretend. 
I got my eyes red, Jimmy, making you. 
My dear, before our love time's at an end 
Think just a minute what it is you do. 
If this were right, my dear, you'd tell me true ; 
You don't, and so it's wrong ; you lie ; and 

she 
Lies too, or else you wouldn't lie to me. 

Women and men have only got one way 
And that way's marriage; other ways are 
lust. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 157 

If you must marry this one, then you may 
If you'll not drop her." 
J. ''No." 

M. " I say you must. 
Or bring my hairs with sorrow to the dust. 
Marry your whore, you'll pay, and there an 

end. 
My God, you shall not have a whore for 
friend. 

By God, you shall not, not while I'm alive. 
Never, so help me God, shall that thing be. 
If she's a woman fit to touch she'll wive, 
If not she's whore, and she shall deal with me. 
And may God's blessed mercy help us see 
And may He make my Jimmy count the cost, 
My little boy who's lost, as I am lost." 

People in love cannot be won by kindness, 
And opposition makes them feel like martyrs. 
When folk are crazy with a drunken blindness 



158 THE WIDOW IN TEE BYE STREET 

It's best to flog them with each other's garters, 
And have the flogging done by Shropshire 

carters, 
Born under Ercall where the white stones lie ; 
Ercall that smells of honey in July. 

Jimmy said nothing in reply, but thought 
That mother was an old, hard, jealous thing. 
" I'll love my girl through good and ill report, 
I shall be true whatever grief it bring." 
And in his heart he heard the death-bell ring 
For mother's death, and thought what it 

would be 
To bury her in churchyard and be free. 

He saw the narrow grave under the wall. 
Home without mother nagging at his dear, 
And Anna there with him at evenfall. 
Bidding him dry his eyes and be of cheer. 
"The death that took poor mother brings me 
near, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 159 

Nearer than we have ever been before, 
Near as the dead one came, but dearer, more." 

^'Good-night, my son, "said mother. ''Night," 

he said. 
He dabbed her brow wi's hps and blew the 

light. 
She lay quite silent crying on the bed, 
Stirring no hmb, but crying through the night. 
He slept, convinced that he was Anna's 

knight. 
And when he went to work he left behind 
Money for mother crying herself blind. 

After that night he came to Anna's call, 
He was a fly in Anna's subtle weavings. 
Mother had no more share in him at all ; 
All that the mother had was Anna's leavings. 
There were more Ues, more lockets, more de- 
ceivings, 



160 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Taunts from the proud old woman, lies from 

him, 
And Anna's coo of ''Cruel. Leave her, Jim." 

Also the foreman spoke : " You make me sick, 
You come-day-go-day-God-send-plenty-beer. 
You put less mizzle on your bit of Dick, 
Or get your time, I'll have no slackers here, 
I've had my eye on you too long, my dear." 
And Jimmy pondered while the man attacked, 
''I'd see her all day long if I were sacked." 

And trembling mother thought, "I'll go to 

see'r. 
She'd give me back my boy if she were told 
Just what he is to me, my pretty dear : 
She wouldn't leave me starving in the cold, 
Like what I am." But she was weak and old. 
She thought, "But if I ast her, I'm afraid 
He'd hate me ever after," so she stayed. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 161 

PART IV 

Bessie, the gipsy, got with child by Ern, 
She joined her tribe again at Shepherd's Meen, 
In that old quarry overgrown with fern, 
Where goats are tethered on the patch of 

green. 
There she reflected on the fool she'd been. 
And plaited kipes and waited for the bastard, 
And thought that love was glorious while it 

lasted. 

And Ern the moody man went moody home, 
To that most gentle girl from Ercall Hill, 
And bade her take a heed now he had come^ 
Or else, by cripes, he'd put her through the 

mill. 
He didn't want her love, he'd had his fill. 
Thank you, of her, the bread and butter sack. 
And Anna heard that Shepherd Ern was back. 



162 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

"Back. And I'll have him back to me," she 
muttered, 

"This lovesick boy of twenty, green as grass, 

Has made me wonder if my brains are but- 
tered. 

He, and his lockets, and his love, the ass. 

I don't know why he comes. Alas ! alas ! 

God knows I want no love ; but every sun 

I bolt my doors on some poor loving one. 

It breaks my heart to turn them out of doors, 
I hear them crying to me in the rain ; 
One, with a white face, curses, one implores, 
"Anna, for God's sake, let me in again, 
Anna, belov'd, I cannot bear the pain." 
Like hoovey sheep bleating outside a fold, 
"Anna, belov'd, I'm in the wind and cold." 

I want no men. I'm weary to the soul 
Of men like moths about a candle flame, 



THE WIBOW IN THE BYE STREET 163 

Of men like flies about a sugar bowl, 
Acting alike, and all wanting the same. 
My dreamed-of swirl of passion never came. 
No man has given me the love I dreamed. 
But in the best of each one something 
gleamed. 

If my dear darling were alive, but he . . . 
He was the same ; he didn't understand. 
The eyes of that dead child are haunting me, 
I only turned the blanket with my hand. 
It didn't hurt, he died as I had planned. 
A little skinny creature, weak and red ; 
It looked so peaceful after it was dead. 

I have been all alone, in spite of all. 
Never a Hght to help me place my feet : 
I have had many a pain and many a fall. 
Life's a long headache in a noisy street. 
Love at the budding looks so very sweet, 



164 TEE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Men put such bright disguises on their lust, 
And then it all goes crumble into dust. 

Jimmy the same, dear, lovely Jimmy, too, 
He goes the self-same way the others went : 
I shall bring sorrow to those eyes of blue. 
He asks the love I'm sure I never meant. 
Am I to blame ? And all his money spent ! 
Men make this shutting doors such cruel pain. 
0, Ern, I want you in my life again." 

On Sunday afternoons the lovers walk 

Arm within arm, dressed in their Sunday 

best. 
The man with the blue necktie sucks a stalk. 
The woman answers when she is addressed. 
On quiet country stiles they sit to rest, 
And after fifty years of wear and tear 
They think how beautiful their courtships 

were. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 165 

Jimmy and Anna met to walk together 

The Sunday after Shepherd Ern returned ; 

And Anna's hat was lovely with a feather 

Bought and dyed blue with money Jimmy 
earned. 

They walked towards Callows Farm, and 
Anna yearned : 

''Dear boy," she said, ''This road is dull to- 
day, 

Suppose we turn and walk the other way." 

They turned, she sighed. " What makes you 
sigh?" he asked. 

"Thinking," she said, "thinking and griev- 
ing, too. 

Perhaps some wicked woman will come 
masked 

Into your life, my dear, to ruin you. 

And trusting every woman as you do 

It might mean death to love and be deceived ; 



166 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

You'd take it hard, I thought, and so I 
grieved." 

''Dear one, dear Anna." " my lovely boy, 
Life is all golden to the finger tips. 
What will be must be : but to-day's a joy. 
Reach me that lovely branch of scarlet hips." 
He reached and gave ; she put it to her lips. 
"And here," she said, ''we come to Plaister 

Turns," 
And then she chose the road to Shepherd 

Ern's. 

As the deft angler, when the fishes rise. 
Flicks on the broadening circle over each 
The delicatest touch of dropping flies. 
Then pulls more line and whips a longer reach. 
Longing to feel the rod bend, the reel screech. 
And the quick comrade net the monster out, 
So Anna played the fly over her trout. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 167 

Twice she passed, thrice, she with the boy 

beside her, 
A lovely fly, hooked for a human heart, 
She passed his Uttle gate, while Jimmy eyed 

her. 
Feeling her beauty tear his soul apart : 
Then did the great trout rise, the great pike 

dart. 
The gate went clack, a man came up the hill, 
The lucky strike had hooked him through the 

gill. 

Her breath comes quick, her tired beauty 

glows. 
She would not look behind, she looked ahead 
It seemed to Jimmy she was like a rose, 
A golden white rose faintly flushed with 

red. 
Her eyes danced quicker at the approaching 

tread, 



168 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Her finger nails dug sharp into her palm. 
She yearned to Jimmy's shoulder, and kept 
calm. 

"Evening," said Shepherd Ern. She turned 

and eyed him. 
Cold and surprised, but interested too, 
To see how much he felt the hook inside him, 
And how much he surmised, and Jimmy 

knew. 
And if her beauty still could make him do 
The love tricks he had gambolled in the past. 
A glow shot through her that her fish was 



"Evening," she said. "Good evening." 

Jimmy felt 
Jealous and angry at the shepherd's tone ; 
He longed to hit the fellow's nose a belt. 
He wanted his beloved his alone. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 169 

A fellow's girl should be a fellow's own. 
Ern gave the lad a glance and turned to Anna, 
Jim might have been in China by his manner. 

"Still walking out ?" ''As you are." ''I'll 

be bound." 
"Can you talk gipsy yet, or plait a kipe ?" 
"I'll teach you if I can when I come round." 
"And when will that be ?" "When the time 

is ripe." 
And Jinuny longed to hit the man a swipe 
Under the chin to knock him out of time, 
But Anna stayed : she still had twigs to 

lime. 

"Come, Anna, come, my dear," he muttered 

low. 
She frowned, and blinked and spoke again to 

Ern. 
"I hear the gipsy has a row to hoe." 



170 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''The more you hear," he said, ''the less 

you'll learn." 
"We've just come out," she said, ''to take a 

turn; 
Suppose you come along: the more the 

merrier." 
"All right," he said, "but how about the 

terrier?" 

He cocked an eye at Jimmy. "Does he 
bite?" 

Jimmy blushed scarlet. "He's a dear," said 
she. 

Ern walked a step, "Will you be in to- 
night?" 

She shook her head, "I doubt if that may be. 

Jim, here's a friend who wants to talk to me, 

So will you go and come another day?" 

"By crimes, I won't !" said Jimmy, "I shall 
stay." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 171 

*'I thought he bit," said Ern, and Anna 

smiled, 
And Jimmy saw the smile and watched her 

face 
While all the jealous devils made him wild ; 
A third in love is always out of place ; 
And then her gentle body full of grace 
Leaned to him sweetly as she tossed her head, 
"Perhaps we two'll be getting on," she said. 

They walked, but Jimmy turned to watch 

the third. 
"I'm here, not you," he said; the shepherd 

grinned : 
Anna was smiling sweet without a word ; 
She got the scarlet berry branch unpinned. 
"It's cold," she said, "this evening, in the 

wind." 
A quick glance showed that Jimmy didn't 

mind her, 



172 TEE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She beckoned with the berry branch behind 
her. 

Then dropped it gently on the broken stones, 
Preoccupied, unheeding, walking straight. 
Saying ^' You jealous boy," in even tones. 
Looking so beautiful, so delicate. 
Being so very sweet : but at her gate 
She felt her shoe unlaced and looked to know 
If Ern had taken up the sprig or no. 

He had, she smiled. ^'Anna," said Jimmy 

sadly, 
"That man's not fit to be a friend of yourn. 
He's nobbut just an oaf ; I love you madly. 
And hearing you speak kind to'm made me 

burn. 
Who is he, then ? " She answered ''Shepherd 

Em, 
A pleasant man, an old, old friend of mine." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 173 

''By cripes, then, Anna, drop him, he's a 
swine." 

''Jimmy," she said, "you must have faith in 

me, 
Faith's all the battle in a love like ours. 
You must believe, my darling, don't you see, 
That life to have its sweets must have its 

sours. 
Love isn't always two souls picking flowers. 
You must have faith. I give you all I can. 
What, can't I say ' Good evening' to a man ? " 

"Yes," he replied, "but not a man like him." 
"Why not a man like him ? " she said, " What 

next?" 
By this they'd reached her cottage in the dim, 
Among the daisies that the cold had kexed. 
"Because I say. Now, Anna, don't be 

vexed." 



174 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''I'm more than vexed," she said, "with 

words Uke these. 
'You say,' indeed. How dare you. Leave 

me, please." 

"Anna, my Anna." "Leave me." She was 

cold, 
Proud and imperious with a lifting lip, 
Blazing within, but outwardly controlled ; 
He had a colt's first instant of the whip. 
The long lash curled to cut a second strip. 
"You to presume to teach. Of course, I 

know 
You're mother's Sunday scholar, aren't you ? 

Go." 

She slammed the door behind her, clutching 

skirts. 
"Anna." He heard her bedroom latches 

thud. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 175 

He learned at last how bitterly love hurts ; 
He longed to cut her throat and see her blood, 
To stamp her bhnking eyeballs into mud. 
''Anna, by God!" Love's many torments 

make 
That tune soon change to "Dear, for Jesus' 

sake." 

He beat the door for her. She never stirred. 
But primming bitter lips before her glass ; 
Admired her hat as though she hadn't heard, 
And tried her front hair parted, and in mass. 
She heard her lover's hasty footsteps pass. 
"He's gone," she thought. She crouched 

below the pane. 
And heard him cursing as he tramped the 

lane. 

Rage ran in Jimmy as he tramped the night ; 
Rage, strongly mingled with a youth's dis- 
gust 



176 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

At finding a beloved woman light, 
And all her precious beauty dirty dust ; 
A tinsel-varnish gilded over lust. 
Nothing but that. He sat him down to rage, 
Beside the stream whose waters never age. 

Plashing, it slithered down the tiny fall 
To eddy wrinkles in the trembling pool 
With that light voice whose music cannot 

pall, 
Always the note of solace, flute-like, cool. 
And when hot-headed man has been a fool. 
He could not do a wiser thing than go 
To that dim pool where purple teazels grow. 

He glowered there until suspicion came. 
Suspicion, anger's bastard, with mean tongue. 
To mutter to him till his heart was flame, 
And every fibre of his soul was wrung, 
That even then Ern and his Anna clung 



THE WIDOW IN THE BTE STREET 177 

Mouth against mouth in passionate embrace. 
There was no peace for Jimmy in the place. 

Raging he hurried back to learn the truth. 
The little swinging wicket glimmered white, 
The chimney jagged the skyline like a tooth, 
Bells came in swoons, for it was Sunday night. 
The garden was all dark, but there was light 
Up in the little room where Anna slept : 
The hot blood beat his brain ; he crept, he 
crept. 

Clutching himself to hear, clutching to know, 
Along the path, rustling with withered 

leaves. 
Up to the apple, too decayed to blow, 
Which crooked a palsied finger at the eaves. 
And up the lichened trunk his body heaves. 
Dust blinded him, twigs snapped, the 

branches shook, 
He leaned along a mossy bough to look. 



178 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Nothing at first, except a guttering candle 
Shaking amazing shadows on the ceiHng, 
Then Anna's voice upon a bar of "Randal, 
Where have you been?" and voice and 

music reeling, 
Trembling, as though she sang with flooding 

feeUng. 
The singing stopped midway upon the stair, 
Then Anna showed in white with loosened 

hair. 

Her back was towards him, and she stood 

awhile. 
Like a wild creature tossing back her mane, 
And then her head went back, he saw a smile 
On the half face half turned towards the pane ; 
Her eyes closed, and her arms went out again. 
Jim gritted teeth, and called upon his Maker, 
She drooped into a man's arms there to take 

ber. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 179 

Agony first, sharp, sudden, like a knife, 
Then down the tree to batter at the door ; 
'^Open there. Let me in. I'll have your 

Hfe. 
You Jezebel of hell, you painted whore. 
Talk about faith, I'll give you faith galore." 
The window creaked, a jug of water came 
Over his head and neck with certain aim. 

''Clear out," said Ern; ''I'm here, not you, 

to-night. 
Clear out. We whip young puppies when 

they yap." 
"If you're a man," said Jim, "come down 

and fight, 
I'll put a stopper on your ugly chap." 
"Go home," said Em; "go home and get 

your pap. 
To kennel, pup, and bid your mother bake 
Some soothing syrup in your puppy cake." 



180 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

There was a dibble sticking in the bed, 

Jim wrenched it out and swung it swiftly- 
round, 

And sent it flying at the shepherd's head : 

"I'll give you puppy-cake. Take that, you 
hound." 

The broken glass went chnking to the 
ground, 

The dibble balanced, checked, and followed 
flat. 

"My God," said Ern, "I'll give you hell for 
that." 

He flung the door ajar with "Now, my pup — 
Hold up the candle, Anna — now, we'll see." 
"By crimes, come on," said Jinrnay; "put 

them up. 
Come, put them up, you coward, here I be." 
And Jim, eleven stone, what chance had he 
Against fourteen ? but what he could he did ; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 181 

Ern swung his right : "That settles you, my 
kid." 

Jimmy went down and out: ''The kid," 

said Ern. 
''A kid, a sucking puppy; hold the light." 
And Anna smiled : "It gave me such a turn. 
You look so splendid, Ernie, when you 

fight." 
She looked at Jim with: "Ern, is he all 

right?" 
"He's coming to." She shuddered, "Pah, 

the brute. 
What things he said;" she stirred him with 

her foot. 

"You go inside," said Ern, "and bolt the 

door, 
I'll deal with him." She went and Jimmy 

stood. 



182 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''Now, pup," said Ern, ''don't come round 

here no more. 
I'm here, not you, let that be understood. 
I tell you frankly, pup, for your own good." 
"Give me my hat," said Jim. He passed 

the gate, 
And as he tottered off he called, "You wait." 

"Thanks, I don't have to," Shepherd Ern 

replied ; 
"You'll do whatever waiting's being done." 
The door closed gently as he went inside. 
The bolts jarred in the channels one by one. 
"I'll give you throwing bats about, my son. 
Anna." "My dear?" "Where are you?" 

"Come and find." 
The light went out, the windows stared out 

blind, 

Bhnd as blind eyes forever seeing dark. 
And in the dim the lovers went upstairs, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BTE STREET 183 

Her eyes fast closed, the shepherd's burning 

stark, 
His Hps entangled in her straying hairs, 
Breath coming short as in a convert's prayers, 
Her stealthy face all drowsy in the dim 
And full of shudders as she yearned to him. 

Jim crossed the water, cursing in his tears, 
*'By cripes, you wait. My God, he's with 

her now, 
And all her hair pulled down over her ears ; 
Loving the blaggard hke a filthy sow. 
I saw her kiss him from the apple bough. 
They say a whore is always full of wiles. 
O God, how sweet her eyes are when she 

smiles. 

Curse her and curse her. No, my God, she's 

sweet. 
It's all a helly nightmare. I shall wake. 



184 THE WIDOW IN THE BTE STREET 

If it were all a dream I'd kiss her feet, 
I wish it were a dream for Jesus' sake. 
One thing : I bet I made his guzzle ache, 
I cop it fair before he sent me down, 
I'll cop him yet some evening on the crown. 

God, God, what pretty ways she had. 
He's kissing all her skin, so white and soft. 
She's kissing back. I think I'm going mad. 
Like rutting rattens in the apple loft. 

She held that light she carried high aloft 
Full in my eyes for him to hit me by, 

1 had the light all dazzling in my eye. 

She had her dress all clutched up to her 

shoulder, 
And all her naked arm was all one gleam. 
It's going to freeze to-night, it's turning 

colder. 
I wish there was more water in the stream, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 185 

I'd drownd myself. Perhaps it's all a dream, 
And by and bye I'll wake and find it stuff. 
By crimes, the pain I suffer's real enough." 

About two hundred yards from Gunder Loss 
He stopped to shudder, leaning on the gate, 
He bit the touchwood underneath the moss ; 
"Rotten, like her," he muttered in his hate; 
He spat it out again with ''But, you wait, 
We'll see again, before to-morrow's past, 
In this life he laughs longest who laughs 
last." 

All through the night the stream ran to the 

sea, 
The different water always saying the same, 
Cat-like, and then a tinkle, never glee, 
A lonely little child alone in shame. 
An otter snapped a thorn twig when he came. 
It drifted down, it passed the Hazel Mill, 



186 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

It passed the Springs; but Jimmy stayed 
there still. 

Over the pointed hill-top came the light, 
Out of the mists on Ercall came the sun, 
Red like a huntsman hallowing after night, 
Blowing a horn to rouse up everyone ; 
Through many glittering cities he had run. 
Splashing the wind vanes on the dewy roofs 
With golden sparks struck by his horses' hoofs. 

The watchman rose, rubbing his rusty eyes, 

He stirred the pot of cocoa for his mate ; 

The fireman watched his head of power rise. 

"What time?" he asked. 

"You haven't long to wait." 

"Now, is it time?" 

"Yes. Let her ripple." Straight 

The whistle shrieked its message, "Up to 

work ! 
Up, or be fined a quarter if you shirk." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 187 

Hearing the whistle, Jimmy raised his head, 
"The warning call, and me in Sunday clo'es ; 
I'd better go ; I've time. The sun looks red, 
I feel so stiff I'm very nearly froze." 
So over brook and through the fields he goes, 
And up the line among the navvies' smiles, 
"Young Jimmy Gurney's been upon the 
tiles." 

The second whistle blew and work began, 

Jimmy worked too, not knowing what he 
did, 

He tripped and stumbled like a drunken 
man; 

He muddled all, whatever he was bid. 

The foreman cursed, "Good God, what ails 
the kid ? 

Hi ! Gurney. You. We'll have you crock- 
ing soon, 

You take a lie down till the afternoon." 



188 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''I won't," he answered. ''Why the devil 

should I ? 
I'm here, I mean to work. I do my piece, 
Or would do if a man could, but how could I 
When you come nagging round and never 

cease ? 
Well, take the job and give me my release, 
I want the sack, now give it, there's my 

pick; 
Give me the sack." The sack was given 

quick. 

PART V 

Dully he got his time-check from the keeper. 
"Curse her," he said; "and that's the end 

of whores" — 
He stumbled drunkenly across a sleeper — 
"Give all you have and get kicked out — 

a-door." 
He cashed his time-check at the station stores. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET- 189 

''Bett'ring yourself, I hope, Jim," said the 

master ; 
''That's it," said Jim; ''and so I will do, 

blast her." 

Beyond the bridge, a sharp turn to the right 
Leads to "The Bull and Boar," the carters' 

rest; 
An inn so hidden it is out of sight 
To anyone not coming from the west. 
The high embankment hides it with its crest. 
Far up above, the Chester trains go by, 
'The drinkers see them sweep against the sky. 

Canal men used it when the barges came, 
The navvies used it when the line was 

making ; 
The pigeons strut and sidle, ruffling, tame, 
The chuckling brook in front sets shadows 

shaking. 



190 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Cider and beer for thirsty workers' slaking, 
A quiet house ; like all that God controls, 
It is Fate's instrument on human souls. 

Thither Jim turned. ''And now I'll drink," 

he said. 
"I'll drink and drink — I never did before — 
I'll drink and drink until I'm mad or dead, 
For that's what comes of meddling with a 

whore." 
He called for Hquor at ''The Bull and Boar" ; 
Moody he drank ; the woman asked him why : 
"Have you had trouble?" "No," he said, 

"I'm dry. 

Dry and burnt up, so give's another drink ; 
That's better, that's much better, that's the 

sort." 
And then he sang, so that he should not 

think, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 191 

His Binger-Bopper song, but cut it short. 
His wits were working like a brewer's wort, 
Until among them came the vision gleaming 
Of Ern with bloody nose and Anna scream- 
ing. 

''That's what I'll do," he muttered; ''knock 

him out. 
And kick his face in with a running jump. 
I'll not have dazzled eyes this second bout, 
And she can wash the fragments under pump." 
It was his ace; but Death had played a 

trump. 
Death the bHnd beggar chuckled, nodding 

dumb, 
"My game; the shroud is ready, Jimmy — 

come." 

Meanwhile, the mother, waiting for her child. 
Had tottered out a dozen times to search. 



192 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

"Jimmy," she said, "you'll drive your mother 

wild; 
Your father's name's too good a name to 

smirch. 
Come home, my dear, she'll leave you in the 

lurch ; 
He was so good, my Httle Jim, so clever ; 
He never stop a night away, not ever. 

He never slept a night away till now. 
Never, not once, in all the time he's been. 
It's the Lord's will, they say, and we must 

bow. 
But O, it's like a knife, it cuts so keen ! 
He'll work in's Sunday clothes, it'll be seen. 
And then they'll laugh, and say 'It isn't 

strange ; 
He slept with her, and so he couldn't change.' 

Perhaps," she thought, "I'm wrong; per- 
haps he's dead ; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 193 

Killed himself like ; folk do in love, they say. 
He never tells what passes in his head, 
And he's been looking late so old and grey. 
A railway train has cut his head away, 
Like the poor hare we found at Maylow's 
shack. 

God, have pity, bring my darling back !" 

All the high stars went sweeping through the 

sky, 
The sun made all the orient clean, clear gold. 
''O blessed God," she prayed, ''do let me die. 
Or bring my wand'ring lamb back into fold. 
The whistle's gone, and all the bacon's cold ; 

1 must know somehow if he's on the line. 
He could have bacon sandwich when he 

dine." 

She cut the bread, and started, short of 
breath, 



194 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Up the canal now draining for the rail ; 
A poor old woman pitted against death, 
Bringing her pennyworth of love for bail. 
Wisdom, beauty, and love may not avail. 
She was too late. "Yes, he was here; oh, 

yes. 
He chucked his job and went." ''Where?" 

"Home, I guess." 

"Home, but he hasn't been home." "Well, 

he went. 
Perhaps you missed him, mother." "Or 

perhaps 
He took the field path yonder through the 

bent. 
He very Hkely done that, don't he, chaps?" 
The speaker tested both his trouser straps 
And took his pick. "He's in the town," he 

said. 
"He'll be all right, after a bit in bed." 



TBE WIDOW IN THE BTE STREET 195 

She trembled down the high embankment's 
ridge, 

Glad, though too late ; not yet too late, in- 
deed. 

For forty yards away, beyond the bridge, 

Jimmy still drank, the devil still sowed seed. 

"A bit in bed," she thought, ''is what I need. 

I'll go to 'Bull and Boar' and rest a bit. 

They've got a bench outside ; they'd let me 
sit." 

Even as two soldiers on a fortress wall 

See the bright fire streak of a coming shell, 

Catch breath, and wonder "Which way will 

it fall? 
To you ? to me ? or will it all be well ?" 
Ev'n so stood life and death, and could not 

tell 
Whether she'd go to th' inn and find her son. 
Or take the field and let the doom be done. 



196 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''No, not the inn," she thought. "People 

would talk. 
I couldn't in the open daytime ; no. 
I'll just sit here upon the timber balk, 
I'll rest for just a minute and then go." 
Resting, her old tired heart began to glow. 
Glowed and gave thanks, and thought itself 

in clover, 
''He's lost his job, so now she'll throw him 

over." 

Sitting, she saw the rusthng thistle-kex, 
The picks flash bright above, the trolleys tip. 
The bridge-stone shining, full of silver specks. 
And three swift children running down the 

dip. 
A Stoke Saint Michael carter cracked his 

whip. 
The water in the runway made its din. 
She half heard singing coming from the inn. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 197 

She turned, and left the inn, and took the path 
And ''Brother Life, you lose," said Brother 

Death, 
''Even as the Lord of all appointed hath 
In this great miracle of blood and breath." 
He doeth all things well, as the book saith. 
He bids the changing stars fulfil their turn, 
His hand is on us when we least discern. 

Slowly she tottered, stopping with the stitch, 
Catching her breath, "0 lawks, a dear, a dear. 
How the poor tubings in my heart do twitch, 
It hurts like the rheumatics very near." 
And every painful footstep drew her clear 
From that young hfe she bore with so much 

pain. 
She never had him to herself again. 

Out of the inn came Jimmy, red with drink, 
Crying: "I'll show her. Wait a bit. I'll 
show her. 



198 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

You wait a bit. I'm not the kid you think. 
I'm Jimmy Gurney, champion tupper- 

thrower, 
When I get done with her you'll never know 

her, 
Nor him you won't. Out of my way, you 

fowls. 
Or else I'll rip the red things off your 

jowls." 

He went across the fields to Plaister's End. 

There was a lot of water in the brook, 

Sun and white cloud and weather on the 

mend 
For any man with any eyes to look. 
He found old Callow's plough-bat, which he 

took. 
"My innings now, my pretty dear," said he. 
"You wait a bit. I'll show you. Now you'll 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 199 

Her chimney smoke was blowing blue and 

faint, 
The wise duck shook a tail across the pool, 
The blacksmith's shanty smelt of burning 

paint. 
Four newly tired cartwheels hung to cool. 
He had loved the place when under Anna's 

rule. 
Now he clenched teeth and flung aside the 

gate, 
There at the door they stood. He grinned 

"Now wait." 

Ern had just brought her in a wired hare. 
She stood beside him stroking down the fur. 
"0, Em, poor thing, look how its eyes do 

stare." 
''It isn't it/' he answered. "It's a her." 
She stroked the breast and plucked away a 

bur. 



200 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

She kissed the pads, and leapt back with a 

shout, 
"My God, he's got the spudder. Ern. Look 

out." 



Era clenched his fists. Too late. He felt no 

pain, 
Only incredible haste in something swift, 
A shock that made the sky black on his brain. 
Then stillness, while a little cloud went drift. 
The weight upon his thigh bones wouldn't hft ; 
Then poultry in a long procession came. 
Grey-legged, doing the goose-step, eyes like 

flame. 

Grey-legged old cocks and hens sedate in age, 
Marching with jerks as though they moved 

on springs. 
With sidelong hate in round eyes red with 

rage, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 201 

And shouldered muskets clipped by jealous 

wings, 
Then an array of horns and stupid things : 
Sheep on a hill with harebells, hare for dinner. 
''Hare." A slow darkness covered up the 



"But Uttle time is right hand fain of blow." 
Only a second changes life to death ; 
Hate ends before the pulses cease to go, 
There is great power in the stop of breath. 
There's too great truth in what the dumb 

thing saith, 
Hate never goes so far as that, nor can. 
''I am what Hfe becomes. D'you hate me, 

man?" 

Hate with his babbling instant, red and 

damning, 
Passed with his instant, having drunken red. 



202 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''You've killed him." 

''No, I've not, he's only shamming. 

Get up." 

"He can't." 

"OGod, he isn't dead." 

"OGod." 

"Here. Get a basin. Bathe his head. 

Ernie, for God's sake, what are you playing at ? 

I only give him one, hke, with the bat." 

Man cannot call the brimming instant back ; 
Time's an affair of instants spun to days ; 
If man must make an instant gold, or black, 
Let him, he may, but Time must go his ways. 
Life may be duller for an instant's blaze. 
Life's an affair of instants spun to years, 
Instants are only cause of all these tears. 

Then Anna screamed aloud. "Help. Mur- 
der. Murder." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 203 

"By God, it is," he said. ''Through you, 

you slut." 
Backing, she screamed, until the blacksmith 

heard her. 
"Hurry," they cried, "the woman's throat's 

being cut." 
Jim had his coat off by the water butt. 
"He might come to," he said, "with wine or 

soup. 
I only hit him once, like, with the scoop." 

"Splash water on him, chaps. I only meant 
To hit him just a clip, like, nothing more. 
There. Look. He isn't dead, his eyelids went. 
And he went down. O God, his head's all tore. 
I've washed and washed : it's all one gob of 

gore. 
He don't look dead to you ? What ? Nor to 

you? 
Not kill, the clip I give him, couldn't do." 



204 THE WIDOW IN TEE BYE STREET 

"God send; he looks damn bad," the black- 
smith said. 

"Py Cot," his mate said, ''she wass alto- 
gether ; 

She hass an illness look of peing ted." 

"Here. Get a glass," the smith said, "and a 
feather." 

"Wass you at fightings or at playings 
whether?" 

"Here, get a glass and feather. Quick's the 
word." 

The glass was clear. The feather never 
stirred. 

"By God, I'm sorry, Jim. That settles it." 
"By God. I've killed him, then." 

"The doctor might." 
"Try, if you like; but that's a nasty hit." 
"Doctor's gone by. He won't be back till 
night." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 205 

''Py Cot, the feather was not looking right." 
"By Jesus, chaps, I never meant to kill 'un. 
Only to bat. I'll go to p'leece and tell 'un. 

Ern, for God's sake speak, for God's sake 

speak." 
No answer followed : Ern had done with 

dust, 
"The p'leece is best," the smith said, "or a 

beak. 
I'll come along ; and so the lady must. 
Evans, you bring the lady, will you just ? 
Tell 'em just how it come, lad. Come your 

ways; 
And Joe, you watch the body where it lays." 

They walked to town, Jim on the blacksmith's 

arm. 
Jinamy was crying like a child, and saying, 
"I never meant to do him any harm." 



206 THE WIBOW IN THE BYE STREET 

His teeth went clack, like bones at mummers 

playing, 
And then he trembled hard and broke out 

praying, 
''God help my poor old mother. If he's 

dead, 
I've brought her my last wages home," he 

said. 

He trod his last free journey down the 

street ; 
Treading the middle road, and seeing both 

sides, 
The school, the inns, the butchers selUng 

meat. 
The busy market where the town divides. 
Then past the tanpits full of stinking hides, 
And up the lane to death, as weak as pith. 
"By God, I hate this, Jimmy," said the 

smith. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STBEET 207 

PART VI 

Anna in black, the judge in scarlet robes, 
A fuss of lawyers' people coming, going. 
The windows shut, the gas aUght in globes. 
Evening outside, and pleasant weather blow- 
ing. 
" They'll hang him ? " ''I suppose so ; there's 

no knowing." 
"A pretty piece, the woman, ain't she, 

John? 
He killed the fellow just for carrying on." 

* ''She give her piece to counsel pretty 

clear." 
"Ah, that she did, and when she stop she 

smiled." 
"She's had a-many men, that pretty dear; 
She's drove a-many pretty fellows wild." 
"More silly idiots they to be beguiled." 



208 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''Well, I don't know." ''Well, I do. See 

her eyes ? 
Mystery, eh ? A woman's mystery's hes." 

"Perhaps." "No p'raps about it, that's the 

truth. 
I know these women ; they're a rotten lot." 
"You didn't use to think so in your 

youth." 
"No; but I'm wiser now, and not so hot. 
Married or buried, / say, wives or shot, 
These unmanned, unattached Maries and 

Susans 
Make life no better than a proper nuisance." 

"Well, I don't know." "Well, if you don't 

you will." 
"I look on women as as good as men." 
"Now, that's the kind of talk that makes 

me ill. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 209 

When have they been as good? I ask you 

when?" 
' ' Always they have. " " They haven ' t . Now 

and then 
P'raps one or two was neither hen nor fury." 
''One for your mother, that. Here comes 

the jiiry." 

Guilty. Thumbs down. No hope. The judge 

passed sentence : 
"A frantic passionate youth, unfit for Ufe, 
A fitting time afforded for repentance, 
Then certain justice with a pitiless knife. 
For her, his wretched victim's widowed 

wife, 
Pity. For her who bore him, pity. (Cheers.) 
The jury were exempt for seven years." 

All bowed ; the Judge passed to the robing- 
room, 



210 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Dismissed his clerks, disrobed, and knelt and 

prayed 
As was his custom after passing doom, 
Doom upon Ufe, upon the thing not made. 
"0 God, who made us out of dust, and 

laid 
Thee in us bright, to lead us to the truth, 
God, have pity upon this poor youth. 

Show him Thy grace, O God, before he die ; 
Shine in his heart ; have mercy upon me 
Who deal the laws men make to travel by 
Under the sun upon the path to Thee ; 
O God, Thou knowest I'm as bhnd as he, 
As blind, as frantic, not so single, worse. 
Only Thy pity spared me from the curse. 

Thy pity, and Thy mercy, God, did save. 
Thy bounteous gifts, not any grace of mine. 
From all the pitfalls leading to the grave, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 211 

From all the death-feasts with the husks and 

swine. 
God, who hast given me all things, now make 

shine 
Bright in this sinner's heart that he may see. 
God, take this poor boy's spirit back to 

Thee." 

Then trembling with his hands, for he was 
old. 

He went to meet his college friend, the Dean, 

The loiterers watched him as his carriage 
rolled. 

"There goes the Judge," said one, and one 
was keen : 

"Hanging that wretched boy, that's where 
he's been." 

A policeman spat, two lawyers talked statis- 
tics, 

"'Crime passionel' in Agricultural Districts." 



212 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''They'd oughtn't hang a boy:" but one 
said ''Stuff. 

This sentimental talk is rotten, rotten. 

The law's the law and not half strict enough, 

Forgers and murderers are misbegotten. 

Let them be hanged and let them be for- 
gotten. 

A rotten fool should have a rotten end ; 

Mend them, you say? The rotten never 
mend." 

And one "Not mend? The rotten not, per- 
haps. 
The rotting would ; so would the just infected. 
A week in quod has ruined lots of chaps 
Who'd all got good in them till prison 

wrecked it." 
And one, "Society must be protected." 
"He's just a kid. She trapped him." "No, 
she didden." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 213 

''He'll be reprieved." ''He mid be and he 
midden." 

So the talk went ; and Anna took the train, 
Too sad for tears, and pale ; a lady spoke 
Asking if she were ill or suffering pain ? 
"Neither," she said; but sorrow made her 

choke, 
"I'm only sick because my heart is broke. 
My friend, a man, my oldest friend here, 

died. 
I had to see the man who killed him, tried. 

He's to be hanged. Only a boy. My friend. 
I thought him just a boy ; I didn't know. 
And Ern was killed, and now the boy's to 

end. 
And all because he thought he loved me so." 
"My dear," the lady said; and Anna, "Oh, 
It's very hard to bear the ills men make, 



214 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

He thought he loved, and it was all mis- 
take." 

"My dear," the lady said; "you poor, poor 
woman, 

Have you no friends to go to ? " "I'm alone. 

I've parents living, but they're both in- 
human. 

And none can cure what pierces to the bone. 

I'll have to leave and go where I'm not 
known. 

Begin my Ufe again." Her friend said "Yes. 

Certainly that. But leave me your address : 

For I might hear of something ; I'll enquire, 
Perhaps the boy might be reprieved or 

pardoned. 
Couldn't we ask the rector or the squire 
To write and ask the Judge? He can't be 

hardened. 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 215 

What do you do ? Is it housework ? Have 

you gardened ? 
Your hands are very white and soft to 

touch." 
"Lately I've not had heart for doing much." 

So the talk passes as the train descends 
Into the vale, and halts, and starts to climb ; 
Heartless is ever swift at making friends. 
Heartless plucks honey from the evil time, 
The heartless soul makes many bells to 

chime : 
Joybells and deathbells, wedding bells and 

dirges, 
Heartless is one of God's appointed scourges. 

Jimmy was taken down into a cell, 
He did not need a hand, he made no fuss. 
The men were kind: ''For what the kid 
done . . . well — 



216 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

The same might come to any one of us." 
They brought him bits of cake at tea time : 

thus 
The love that fashioned all in human ken, 
Works in the marvellous hearts of simple men. 

And in the nights (they watched him night 

and day) 
They told him bits of stories through the 

grating, 
Of how the game went at the football play, 
And how the rooks outside had started mating. 
And all the time they knew the rope was 

waiting, 
And every evening friend would say to friend, 
''I hope we've not to drag him at the end." 

And poor old mother came to see her son, 
"The Lord has gave," she said, ''The Lord 
has took ; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 217 

I loved you very dear, my darling one, 
And now there's none but God where we can 

look. 
We've got God's promise written in His 

Book, 
He will not fail ; but oh, it do seem hard." 
She hired a room outside the prison yard. 

"Where did you get the money for the room ? 
And how are you living, mother ; how' 11 you 

live?" 
''It's what I'd saved to put me in the tomb, 
I'll want no tomb but what the parish give." 
"Mother, I lied to you that time, O forgive, 
I brought home half my wages, half I spent, 
And you went short that week to pay the 

rent. 

I went to see'r, I spent my money on her. 
And you who bore me paid the cost in pain. 



218 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

You went without to buy the clothes upon 

her: 
A hat, a locket, and a silver chain. 
mother dear, if all might be again, 
Only from last October, you and me ; 

mother dear, how different it would be. 

We were so happy in the room together, 
Singing at 'Binger-Bopper,' weren't us, just? 
And going a-hopping in the summer weather, 
And all the hedges covered white with dust, 
And blackberries, and that, and traveller's 
trust. 

1 thought her wronged, and true, and sweet, 

and wise. 
The devil takes sweet shapes when he tells 



Mother, my dear, will you forgive your son ? " 
"God knows I do, Jim, I forgive you, dear; 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 219 

You didn't know, and couldn't, what you done. 
God pity all poor people suffering here, 
And may His mercy shine upon us clear, 
And may we have His Holy Word for mark, 
To lead us to His Kingdom through the 
dark." 

*'Amen. Amen," said Jimmy; then they 

kissed. 
The warders watched, the little larks were 

singing, 
A plough team jangled, turning at the rist ; 
Beyond, the mild cathedral bells were ringing. 
The elm-tree rooks were cawing at the 

springing : 
O beauty of the time when winter's done, 
And all the fields are laughing at the sun ! 

" I s'pose they've brought the line beyond the 
Knapp?" 



220 TEE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

''Ah, and beyond the Barcle, so they say." 
''Hearing the rooks begin reminds a chap. 
Look queer, the street will, with the lock 

away ; 
O God, ril never see it." "Let us pray. 
Don't think of that, but think," the mother 

said, 
"Of men going on long after we are dead. 

Red helpless httle things will come to birth, 
And hear the whistles going down the line. 
And grow up strong and go about the earth, 
And have much happier times than yours and 

mine; 
And some day one of them will get a sign, 
And talk to folk, and put an end to sin. 
And then God's blessed kingdom will begin. 

God dropped a spark down into everyone. 
And if we find and fan it to a blaze 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 221 

It'll spring up and glow, like — like the sun, 
And light the wandering out of stony ways. 
God warms his hands at man's heart when 

he prays, 
And Hght of prayer is spreading heart to heart ; 
It'll light all where now it lights a part. 

And God who gave His mercies takes His 

mercies, 
And God who gives beginning gives the end. 
I dread my death ; but it's the end of curses, 
A rest for broken things too broke to mend. 
O Captain Christ, our blessed Lord and 

Friend, 
We are two wandered sinners in the mire. 
Burn our dead hearts with love out of Thy 

fire. 

And when thy death comes, Master, let us 
bear it 



222 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STBEET 

As of Thy will, however hard to go ; 

Thy Cross is infinite for us to share it, 

Thy help is infinite for us to know. 

And when the long trumpets of the Judgment 

blow 

May our poor souls be glad and meet agen, 

And rest in Thee." ''Say, 'Amen,' Jim." 

"Amen." 
* * * * * 

There was a group outside the prison gate. 
Waiting to hear them ring the passing bell, 
Waiting as empty people always wait 
For the strong toxic of another's hell. 
And mother stood there, too, not seeing well, 
Praying through tears to let His will be done, 
And not to hide His mercy from her son. 

Talk in the little group was passing quick. 
"It's nothing now to what it was, to watch." 
"Poor wretched kid, I bet he's feeling sick." 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 223 

''Eh? What d'you say, chaps? Someone 

got a match?" 
"They draw a bolt and drop you down a 

hatch 
And break your neck, whereas they used to 

strangle 
In the old times, when you could see them 
le." 



Someone said, ''Off hats," when the bell 

began. 
Mother was whimpering now upon her 

knees. 
A broken ringing like a beaten pan, 
It sent the sparrows wavering to the trees. 
The wall-top grasses whickered in the breeze. 
The broken ringing clanged, clattered and 

clanged. 
As though men's bees were swarming, not 

men hanged. 



224 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Now certain Justice with the pitiless knife. 
The white, sick chaplain snuffling at the nose, 
''I am the resurrection and the life." 
The bell still clangs, the small procession goes. 
The prison warders ready ranged in rows. 
''Now, Gurney, come, my dear; it's time," 

they said. 
And ninety seconds later he was dead. 

Some of life's sad ones are too strong to die. 
Grief doesn't kill them as it kills the weak. 
Sorrow is not for those who sit and cry 
Lapped in the love of turning t'other cheek, 
But for the noble souls austere and bleak 
Who have had the bitter dose and drained 

the cup 
And wait for Death face fronted, standing up. 

As the last man upon the sinking ship, 
Seeing the brine creep brightly on the deck. 



THE WIDOW IN TEE BYE STREET 225 

Hearing aloft the slatting topsails rip, 
Ripping to rags among the topmast's wreck, 
Yet hoists the new red ensign without speck. 
That she, so fair, may sink with colours 

flying, 
So the old widowed mother kept from dying. 

She tottered home, back to the little room, 

It was all over for her, but for life ; 

She drew the bhnds, and trembled in the 

gloom ; 
''I sat here thus when I was wedded wife ; 
Sorrow sometimes, and joy; but always 

strife. 
Struggle to live except just at the last, 
God, I thank Thee for the mercies past. 

Harry, my man, when we were courting; 

eh . . . 
The April morning up the Cony-gree. 

Q 



226 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

How grand he looked upon our wedding day. 
'I wish we'd had the bells,' he said to me; 
And we'd the moon that evening, I and he, 
And dew come wet, oh, I remember how, 
And we come home to where I'm sitting now. 

And he lay dead here, and his son was born 

here ; 
He never saw his son, his little Jim. 
And now I'm all alone here, left to mourn 

here, 
And there are all his clothes, but never him. 
He's down under the prison in the dim, 
With quicklime working on him to the bone. 
The flesh I made with many and many a 

groan. 

Oh, how his little face come, with bright hair. 
Dear little face. We made this room so snug ; 
He sit beside me in his little chair, 



THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 227 

I give him real tea sometimes in his mug. 
He liked the velvet in the patchwork rug. 
He used to stroke it, did my pretty son, 
He called it Bunny, little Jimmy done. 

And then he ran so, he was strong at running. 
Always a strong one, like his dad at that. 
In summertimes I done my sewing sunning. 
And he'd be sprawling, playing with the cat. 
And neighbours brought their knitting out to 

chat 
Till five o'clock ; he had his tea at five ; 
How sweet life was when Jimmy was alive." 

Darkness and midnight, and the midnight 

chimes. 
Another four-and-twenty hours begin. 
Darkness again, and many, many times, 
The alternating light and darkness spin 
Until the face so thin is still more thin, 



228 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

Gazing each earthly evening, wet or fine, 
For Jimmy coming from work along the line. 

Over her head the Chester wires hum. 
Under the bridge the rocking engines flash. 
''He's very late this evening, but he'll come 
And bring his little packet full of cash 
(Always he does), and supper's cracker hash, 
That is his favourite food excepting bacon. 
They say my boy was hanged; but they're 
mistaken." 

And sometimes she will walk the cindery 

mile. 
Singing, as she and Jimmy used to do. 
Singing "The parson's dog lep over a stile," 
Along the path where water lilies grew. 
The stars are placid on the evening's blue, 
Burning like eyes so calm, so unafraid. 
On all that God has given and man has made. 



THE WIDOW IN TEE BYE STREET 229 

Burning they watch, and mothhke owls come 

out, 
The redbreast warbles shrilly once and stops ; 
The homing cowman gives his dog a shout, 
The lamps are lighted in the village shops. 
Silence ; the last bird passes ; in the copse 
The hazels cross the moon, a nightjar spins, 
Dew wets the grass, the nightingale begins. 

Singing her crazy song the mother goes, 
Singing as though her heart were full of 

peace. 
Moths knock the petals from the dropping 

rose, 
Stars make the ghmmering pool a golden 

fleece, 
The moon droops west, but still she does not 

cease, 
The little mice peep out to hear her sing. 
Until the inn-man's cockerel shakes his wing. 



230 THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET 

And in the sunny dawns of hot Julys, 
The labourers going to meadow see her there. 
Rubbing the sleep out of their heavy eyes, 
They lean upon the parapet to stare ; 
They see her plaiting basil in her hair, 
Basil, the dark red wound-wort, cops of 

clover. 
The blue self-heal and golden Jacks of Dover. 

Dully they watch her, then they turn to go 
To that high Shropshire upland of late hay ; 
Her singing lingers with them as they mow, 
And many times they try it, now grave, now 

gay, 
Till, with full throat, over the hills away, 
They lift it clear ; oh, very clear it towers 
Mixed with the swish of many falling flowers. 



T 



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